


Only the Good Die Young

by oiuytrewq36



Category: Queer as Folk (US)
Genre: Afterlife, Drama, Established Relationship, Happy Ending, Humor, M/M, Post-Canon, Romance, Soap Opera
Language: English
Status: In-Progress
Published: 2020-10-17
Updated: 2020-12-25
Packaged: 2021-03-07 17:22:11
Rating: Explicit
Warnings: Major Character Death
Chapters: 28
Words: 56,765
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/26691379
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/oiuytrewq36/pseuds/oiuytrewq36
Summary: tl;dr: only happy endings here, despite the scary tagging. read on for more.So here’s the thing: this is an entirely frivolous enterprise on my part. It’s basically just a bunch of emotions put in a blender and poured into a story-shaped Jell-O mold, then refrigerated, turned upside down, and served up to you all on the metaphorical melamine plate that is AO3 (that’s a fifties cooking joke, by the way. I can’t stand aspic as a food, but it makes a decently palatable literary device). This may end up being a novel; it may end up being a vignette-based series; it may end up being an CBS All Access-exclusive miniseries - highly unlikely, but so is light being simultaneously a wave and a particle, so who knows?This story is set primarily in the afterlife, which means that the characters have to die in order to go there, hence the death tag, but - spoiler alert - I’m not going to kill anyone in an excessively tragic soap opera accident, and they’ll be happy and unharmed up there afterwards.  It’s set in the same universe as the rest of my work (if you’ve read my notes on the last series, this is the “out there” project I was referring to, in case you couldn’t tell).
Relationships: Brian Kinney/Justin Taylor (Queer as Folk)
Comments: 194
Kudos: 66





	1. Chapter 1

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> If you’re new here, I’ll just mention that this story is really meant as a sequel to my primary work on this site, a set of 3 series that starts with [We Will Survive](https://archiveofourown.org/series/1881736). Do whatever you want, obviously, but a small number of the characters here will be unfamiliar to you if you read this story first.

Whether due to genetic good luck, a lifelong obsession with health food, or just plain stubbornness, it happens that Brian Kinney makes it eighty-one years before having a life-threatening diagnosis, one small battle with testicular cancer aside. He and Justin sit in a beautifully upholstered office and listen as a fortyish man - young, impossibly young, how did he ever think forty was old? - explains that due to some small but growing weakness in some bodily component that he can’t be bothered to Google, Brian’s heart will stop working in three to five years, give or take.

There are surgical options, the doctor explains to Justin, who’s holding his hand and making the face he makes when he’s trying to be brave for Brian, but operating on an octogenarian patient is risky under the best of circumstances, and it likely wouldn’t give them much time even if he did make it through alive.

They go home and talk, holding on to each other. 

“I’m not having the surgery,” Brian says, not for the first time. “It’s too risky.”

“I know,” Justin says, pressing wet eyelashes to his cheek. 

Brian kisses him gently, sweetly, familiar warm lips against his, smiling even as he tastes Justin’s tears. Selfishly, he thinks, he is grateful that he will die first, that he will never have to live in a world without Justin. (That’s not exactly how it turns out, as it happens, but at this moment he doesn’t know that.)

He pulls away. “This isn’t the end, Sunshine. You heard the doctor; I’ve got years left, and I’m damn well going to live them.”

The next day, they spend hours poring over travel sites, planning a six-month world tour, buying tickets to museums on every continent and ordering luggage and clothing and multipacks of condoms.

They live their last years of their earthly relationship as they’ve lived the several preceding decades: happily, extravagantly, loving and bickering and fucking and dancing as much as their aging bodies allow. 

Then one day, Justin wakes up, rolls onto his side, and realizes that Brian isn’t breathing. He feels for a pulse, although he knows he won’t find one, and calls 911, surprising himself with his own calmness. Then he gathers Brian’s cold body into his arms and holds him tight, letting his tears drip into his hair, until the ambulance arrives.

Daphne is the first one he calls. She shows up at the apartment with red eyes, and when he opens the door she doesn’t say anything, just folds him into her arms and lets him sob himself hoarse as the sun begins to filter through the windows.

She helps him call Michael, and Molly, and Gus, and Lindsay and Mel, and Emmett, and Tucker, and Frances, and Sam and Quinn, most of their other friends and family now gone already, and within the space of a few hours the condo is filled with people, all forming a protective circle around Justin and his grief. He barely speaks that first awful day, but he doesn’t need to; the others take turns hugging him, not trying to console him, just reminding him that he isn’t alone. 

Justin has never lived by himself, save for his short stint in the shithole studio he rented in Pittsburgh a lifetime ago. It doesn’t exactly suit him, but he doesn’t dislike it, necessarily. Brian is everywhere in the condo, so much so that he has trouble believing that he isn’t about to walk around a corner wearing a designer suit and a rakish grin any second, and Justin doesn’t mind it much. It helps him be less lonely - a little, anyway.

Eventually, a few years on, Justin joins a small local artists’ collective. His fame is far above any of the other members’ - they treat him a little like a mystical creature, which is more enjoyable than it sounds - but he’s happy just to be creating in the company of others again.

It’s there that he meets Asher, a sculptor whose husband of four decades had died a year prior. They bond over their shared grief, at the common understanding of losing someone so much a part of themselves, and slowly, unexpected to either of them, they drift into a quiet love affair. 

They never move in together (Justin has become far too accustomed to having a place to himself, if he’s being honest) but it eases the loneliness more than he’d ever expected anything could to have someone to hold, to kiss, to have the ability to go to sleep and wake up with another person in his bed, on occasion. He still misses Brian, of course, still dreams of him, still paints him, but he no longer wakes up each day wishing he could stay in the space between sleep and consciousness where he doesn’t yet know that Brian is gone. Asher is reserved, sweet and funny - he’s nothing like Brian, really, but Justin was never looking for a replacement - and they make each other happy, spending peaceful afternoons in each other’s studios working side-by-side.

The world goes on outside them, of course. More friends pass on as Justin watches, never having realized before the awaiting heartbreak of being ten years younger or more than most of his cobbled-together family. He feels each one just as deeply as the last, but Justin is nothing if not a survivor, and so he keeps on living.

Then, one day, Justin is sitting on the floor of his studio, sketching the room, and he’s suddenly captivated by the way the sun seems to change, rays blurring into something soft and wondrous as they pass through the wall of windows. He raises his stylus to trace the shapes they make on the floor, but it falls from his hand as he slumps over, struck down (although he doesn’t know it) by a massive, unforeseen stroke. His last earthly thought is an image of beauty, dust motes turned to diamonds in the sunlight.

Justin comes to consciousness perplexed. He is sitting in a 1970s-esque office, it appears, rows and rows of well-populated cubicles, clean fluorescent light illuminating mud-gray carpets and office chairs upholstered in rough green polyester.

“Good afternoon, Mr. Taylor,” a small, balding man, sitting next to him at the desk, says. He looks a little like Ted, and for a second Justin thinks he is, which is absurd - Ted has been dead for fifteen years, and this man has the wrong eyes, anyway, too light, a different shape.

Justin looks around the office, a gentle buzz of chatter floating over their heads. “What...”

The man gives him a genial smile. “I’m going to break this to you bluntly, because I’ve found that doing it slowly can often cause more consternation in the end. All right?”

Justin just looks at him. Then he glances down at his hands, and he realizes that the skin there is not wrinkled, no liver spots or purple veins in sight. He looks back up. “Am I-”

“Dead?” the man asks. “Sorry, sounds a bit harsh. But other words don’t really do the trick.”

Justin twists his wedding ring around his de-aged finger. “I’m dead.”

“Yes.”

“But I’m, uh-”

He gestures vaguely at his clearly functional body.

The man smiles again. “You’re quicker at this than most. Artists often do well at this part. More space in the brain for the fantastical, I suppose.”

Justin doesn’t say anything.

“You’ve probably noticed that the body you’re in right now is not the one you woke up with this morning,” the man continues. “When people arrive here, they’re placed in a body from a time in their life for which they have particularly fond memories. You are, I believe, twenty-eight, with a few differences - we leave tattoos, piercings, that kind of thing regardless of the age you’re assigned. You can change your appearance, of course, and switch to whatever stage of adulthood you’d like, although most people do choose to remain in the body we select for them.”

“And where is- here?” Justin asks.

The man spreads his arms. “Well, the living call it the afterlife, Mr. Taylor, although I’d argue that since we’re living as well, it’s just ... life.”

Justin takes that in. Then he says, still fiddling with his ring, “Does everyone come here when they die?”

The man nods. “Some take longer than others. Those who hold unfounded hate within themselves when they leave earth spend time in a different place first, a kind of boarding school, if you will. But I don’t think that’s what you’re asking about, is it?”

He stands up, offering Justin a hand in assistance. Justin takes it, feeling strangely steady and calm. “We’ve found that the transition into life here is made much easier when it’s slowed a little, to avoid the overwhelming experience of meeting all of one’s loved ones on the day of one’s death,” the man says, walking into an open elevator door and gesturing for Justin to follow. “So we place each new arrival with someone who they knew on earth, someone they care for deeply, who can help to guide them as they adjust to life here.”

Processing what he thinks the man is saying, Justin has forgotten how to breathe. The man puts a hand on his shoulder as the elevator descends with a smoothness undivulged by its vintage carpeting and wood-paneled walls.

“For almost everyone outside this building, time is frozen right now. We’ve given you a week in the space of a few seconds - quantum physics is really something, but I don’t think you want to hear me go on about that - so that you and your guide can spend a few peaceful days talking and getting you used to the ways of this world before you’re thrown into it head-on.”

“My guide,” Justin says, and then the elevator doors open. It’s the first floor, presumably, a pleasant modern lobby filled with lush tropical plants and white marble fixtures, but Justin couldn’t give less of a fuck about the design of the place if he tried, because _Brian_ is standing in the middle of it, alive and whole and looking the way he looked at maybe thirty, inconceivably young and beautiful, wearing jeans and a white T-shirt and a heartwrenching expression of hope. 

They recognize each other at the same moment, and then they fly together, colliding in an explosion of joy and passion and disbelief. Justin takes his face in his hands and kisses him, and yes, oh yes, this is his Brian, kissing him back with fervent need, wrapping him up in his arms, lifting him off the ground, holding him warm and safe and tight. 

They break apart, but not too far, after a small eternity of an embrace. Justin strokes Brian’s face, his throat swollen with tears. 

“Is it really you?” he whispers, and Brian laughs softly and presses their foreheads together. The movement is so _him_ that Justin starts to cry again, because he already knows the answer.

Brian responds anyway. “It’s really me, Sunshine,” he murmurs, hands firm on his shoulders, keeping Justin in a solid embrace.

“God,” Justin breathes, and he doesn’t know what to say after. He closes his eyes, inhales Brian, brushes his lips against his jaw, his nose, “I missed you,” he says, the words ludicrously small against what he’s feeling.

“I missed you too,” Brian whispers back, lips against his ear. “So much.”

The small balding man gives them a friendly wave as they leave the lobby doors, coming out onto a sprawling city street. Justin can smell salt air swept by cool tendrils of wind between sun-dappled buildings. Everything is frozen, birds in midair, a man flipping a coin.

“Forgot how strange this is,” Brian says, arm around his shoulders, still looking at him - he’s barely stopped since they left the building.

“Who was your, uh, welcome person?” Justin asks, feeling so much at once that he doesn’t know if he wants to scream out in ecstasy or collapse sobbing into Brian’s arms, and yet there’s the distinct sensation of disbelief there to separate him, alienate him, almost, from those stronger emotions.

“Debbie,” Brian says, smiling slightly. “She cooked me a month’s worth of casseroles and made me watch practically every movie Barbara Streisand ever made.”

Justin laughs, and Brian makes a small noise at the sound, presses his lips to Justin’s temple.

“There’s so many people I’ll be able to see,” Justin says, realizing it out loud. Brian tightens his arm around him. “Oh my God, my mother. And Debbie, and Vic, and Emmett and Ted and Michael and-”

He cuts off, tongue-tied by the enormity of it. He looks at Brian, eyes just a touch desperate, and Brian looks back with soothing, loving reassurance.

“This is a dream, right?” Justin says, finally. “This is a dream, and I’ll wake up tomorrow and I probably won’t even remember it, and-”

Brian puts a finger to his lips, stopping the spiraling flow of words. “It’s not a dream,” he says. He moves his hand to run it through Justin’s hair. “This is real. I promise.”

That’s the moment when Justin begins to believe.

They arrive at the house - Jesus, they have a _house_ in _heaven_. It’s a strange squat building, modern and stylish, of course, and it sits on a short cliff just above an endless stretch of beach and ocean.

“Christ,” Justin whispers, and Brian kisses his cheek, softly, murmurs, “I know.”

Then Brian grins at him with just a touch of the seductive charm that Justin fell in love with all those years ago. “Wait until you see the inside.”

The house reminds Justin of the condo in New York, and he realizes that Brian has even put some of the same furnishings in as they walk through the rooms. There’s a huge, beautiful studio with a glass ceiling - a _glass ceiling_ , and Justin already can’t stop thinking about drawing the shapes that raindrops will make falling onto it - a wide sunken living room with a band of window all the way around, a beautiful kitchen leading to an outdoor deck.

They reach the bedroom, a clean airy box with an unbelievable view of the ocean, and Justin looks at Brian and all the desperate passionate love that has been held back inside him breaks free, and then they’re kissing, not like earlier, like sex, now, tongues fucking each other’s mouths, hands fighting for a grip in each other’s hair, laughing in each other’s mouths at their own need.

They undress with the familiarity that comes from having done it thousands of times before, years apart making little difference in their knowledge of each other’s bodies. When they’re both naked, neither moves for a moment, staring at muscles and joints and smooth skin, overwhelmed, not knowing where to start, what to devour first. Then Brian drops to his knees before Justin, presses his face to his stomach and makes a tiny sobbing noise, stroking the ridges of his abs, fingers greedy for skin, and Justin yanks him back to his feet, kisses him with demanding urgency, walks him backward until they fall as one, mouths and bodies fused, onto the bed.

Brian’s just shifted Justin onto his back when he looks him right in the eye, clear sky-blue gaze piercing as ever, and says, quietly, “Don’t be gentle. Please.”

Brian nods. He knows what he means.

Justin is unprepared for the feeling of having Brian inside him again. The first thrust hurts, hurts like the first time, Brian pushing in unrelentingly as Justin clenches his fists in the sheets and tries not to make any sounds that might cause him to stop, newly rejuvenated body tensing in ways that defy decades of experience. 

When he’s all the way in, Brian stops and stares down at him, mouth open, eyes glazed.

“You’re-” he whispers, hoarse, and drops his head to Justin’s chest. “Oh my God. You feel-”

He makes a desperate noise, and Justin smiles up at him and bears down on his cock as he begins to thrust, deep, hard, conquering strokes that light Justin up from the inside, make him gasp and whine and pull Brian’s face into his neck.

Brian is moaning, low, animal sounds pouring from him as he snaps into Justin, shoving him up the bed, and Justin just claws at his back and begs for more.

Justin realizes at some point that there are tears on his face, and on Brian’s as well, the two of them holding each other and crying, silently, in the unutterable rightness of coming home. They cling to each other even as they writhe on the bed, wrestling towards bliss together, kissing and biting in turn, losing themselves, blending into a single soul and back again. 

Justin comes gasping _I love you, I love you, I love you_ , and Brian just sobs into his neck and clutches his body tight enough to leave tiny fingertip-shaped bruises that will show up the next morning, ramming him harder and harder, loving every tiny groan each new thrust punches out of Justin. They fall asleep curved around each other, drained. When Justin wakes up and feels Brian warm against him, realizes where he is, he’s hit by a gut-slug of love and need and gratitude, unable to take his eyes, his hands off of him.

They bite at each other’s mouths, greedy, frantic, the eternity of togetherness stretching before them no object to their desperate immediate need to bathe in gallons of intimate ecstasy. On that first morning, Brian wakes up to the best blowjob he’s had in over a decade, then fucks Justin through a series of paroxysmal orgasms until he’s floating in a delirium of hot drunken pleasure, blond hair a halo around his debauched beatific face. He turns him over after what may or may not turn out to be their last round, spreads him open to check for damage, then ends up eating him out, unable to resist lapping at his puffy, inflamed asshole, while Justin wails, alternately cursing him and begging him to keep going. The sex between them has always been much more than good, but this is _glorious_ in a way neither of them has ever imagined, sublime physical pleasure blending with the rapturous happiness of being able to hold each other again.

Justin craves him, craves his body, his presence, like a cigarette on the fourth day after quitting, like the need to put an idea onto canvas during a creative frenzy. He wakes up starving for Brian, they fuck and he’s starving for Brian, he passes out starving for Brian. He can’t get enough, and Brian is just as desperate, fucking him over and over again until his legs give out and Justin has to ride him instead, rimming him and sucking him and kissing him with bruised, swollen lips, begging Justin to fuck him senseless after they’ve come six, seven times already, but Justin does it, of course he does, opening him up with beautiful long fingers and then pounding him silly like the spectacular top he is, making him come shaking and screaming before the two of them slump in a come-splattered heap to the mattress, arms still around each other.

Hours or days later, they manage to stop fucking for more than five minutes at a time, and they lay in bed in each other’s arms on bare sheets, covers long ago thrown to the floor, legs twining together, kissing endlessly, talking in words and movements and soaking in the unimaginable euphoria of their reunion.

Brian can’t stop touching him. He’s running his hands down Justin’s sides, tracing his face with his fingertips, looking at him with raw vulnerable wonder, drowning himself willingly and eagerly in his beauty, his smile, the softness of his skin.

“I can’t believe you’re really here,” he says, finally, and Justin catches his hand where it’s traveling up his shoulder and kisses it.

“Neither can I,” he says, smiling that gorgeous heart-stopping smile that Brian has never stopped dreaming of. 

“I love you,” he whispers, resting his forehead against Justin’s and closing his eyes. “Fuck, I love you so much, Justin, and you’re _here_.”

Justin sighs, softly, happily. “This all just seems too good to be true,” he murmurs, bringing one hand up to cup Brian’s neck.

“I know,” Brian says. “I’ve found it’s easiest just to ... accept it, allow myself to be happy instead of always waiting for the other shoe to drop.”

Justin looks at him and laughs. “Jesus, you really have evolved,” he says, and then pauses, face turning more serious. “I’m glad you’ve figured it out.”

Brian kisses him, savoring every part of it, Justin’s silky hair under his fingers, Justin’s soft lips against his tongue, Justin, Justin, Justin. “Figured what out?”

Smiling again, Justin kisses the side of his jaw. “That what I spent decades trying to get you to believe is true: you deserve to be happy, and loved, and the world won’t end if you’re kind to yourself once in a while.”

Brian smiles back and rolls them over, kissing reverently across Justin’s throat, feeling the heat on his skin. “You were right, as usual.”

“And now we have all the time we want to be young and beautiful and in love,” Justin says, eyes somewhere far away. “So I guess I’ll have to accept that this is this good, and it’s also real.”

Brian holds him even tighter, hands clutching at his waist and shoulders. “I guess so.”

Soon after that, Justin discovers something else. He’s drawing Brian sleeping, but he has to wake him up, has to tell him. 

“Look at this,” he says, urgent, showing Brian the sketch.

Brian grins at him. “I already know I’m hot, Sunshine. You don’t need to be all dramatic about it.”

But Justin can’t bother to come up with a witty comeback, because- “I just spent an hour on this,” he says.

Brian’s eyes widen, and he looks at the paper and pencil, then to Justin’s right hand, which is perfectly steady.

“You mean-”

“I can draw like this again,” Justin whispers, eyes brimming. Brian feels tears sting his own eyes, pulls Justin into his arms and kisses him deep enough to make him gasp for air.

They wander around the house, take walks on the beach and through the frozen city, eat and fuck and laugh and talk, and neither of them is able to stop smiling. It feels like drowning in joy.

Justin’s lying on top of Brian one night, kissing and biting down his chest, when he stops. Brian groans and tries to nudge his head back down, but he resists.

“You know I’ve loved you at every age, right?” Justin says, soft concern in his incredible eyes.

“What-” Brian says.

Justin pokes him in the chest. “You _know_ ,” he says, “that you don’t have to be young for me to think you’re the most beautiful man I’ve ever seen. Yeah?”

Brian isn’t sure exactly what this has to do with getting his dick sucked, but he goes along with it. “Yeah...”

Justin sighs. “What I’m saying is, just because I want to do nothing but worship your body for the rest of eternity, it doesn’t mean I wanted anything other than what we had when we were still, you know, aging on a linear timeline.”

Brian laughs and runs fond hands through Justin’s hair, pecks him on the lips. “I know. I watched enough memories of us - have I shown you how that works? - to figure out the parts I was too much of an idiot to allow myself to believe on Earth.”

Justin smiles down at him, and Brian feels his heart melt out of his ribcage and soak into the sheets under them. “You watched memories of me and you?”

“Whenever I was missing you,” Brian says. “Disgustingly sentimental, I know.”

Justin just closes his eyes, resting his cheek against Brian’s.

Brian grins and pulls him back down for a much dirtier kiss. “Also,” he says, voice silky, “if you pick the right moments, it’s the best porn you’ll ever see.”

Justin’s breath hitches, and he moans, soft, a little surprised. “Yeah?”

“Do you remember when you woke up with the biggest morning hard-on of your life and I skipped out on work so that I could nail you to the mattress for six hours straight?”

Flushing, beautifully, Justin nods, just a little too fast. “I came three times in one go that day, how could I ever forget?”

“Mmmm,” Brian says, nibbling on the translucent pink edge of his ear. “Well, this one time I was horny and missing you, so I tried to match you orgasm for orgasm while I watched. My dick was practically raw afterwards.”

Justin makes a broken noise, rubbing against Brian’s right thigh, desperate for friction, and Brian just keeps talking.

“Another time I watched us fucking on our honeymoon and jerked off until I passed out. I had to go do three guys in a row at Inferno - that’s the big club here, you’ll love it - before I stopped having a constant boner after I woke up.”

Justin whimpers. “You’ll have to show me how to do that sometime,” he says, brain completely derailed by thoughts of Brian rendered insatiable.

Still smiling, ferally, Brian flicks his fingers in the air and a screen appears. He pulls Justin into his chest. “I’d make popcorn, but I think poppers might be more appropriate.”

Some time later, maybe five days into the week, Brian asks about Asher. He brings it up out of the blue, one evening when they’re curled up together on a blanket in front of the fire.

“Do you miss him?” he says, and Justin doesn’t have to ask to know who he’s talking about.

He sighs. “We were together for almost seven years, and we were happy. So yes, I miss him. But it’s strange, because this is- it’s so unbelievably good, more than I ever dreamed of, and I feel almost guilty for leaving him behind and grieving when I’m this happy.”

Brian nudges his cheek with his nose. “You loved him.”

“Very much,” Justin says, taking his hands. “But we both understood that for each other, there was always going to be someone else who had been our lifetime partner - you and Jordan, the loves of our lives. It’s one of the reasons we worked.”

“I know Jordan,” Brian says, after a while. “He’s a good guy.”

“I’d like to meet him,” Justin says. “And God, Asher will be so happy to see him again when he gets here.”

Brian kisses him, long and slow. “Am I-” he says, and breaks off, petrified at what he’s about to say but even more afraid of not saying it, not knowing for sure. “Am I still the love of your life?”

“Oh, Brian,” Justin says, voice grainy and tight, and pulls him closer, kissing him deeply and running gentle hands across his back. “You are, of course you are. In life and after.”

Brian swallows, closes his eyes, breathes him in. “And you are- to me, too, always. Always.”

“I know,” Justin whispers, kissing his temples, his cheekbones, his brows, tiny warm soft kisses that fill Brian with a beautiful bursting contentedness, heart aching with want and longing and happiness. “I know.”

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> So, my super secret project has been revealed. I started work on this story almost a month ago, well before the end of my last series, because I realized that there was no way I wanted to stop writing in this universe, but I was also starting to worry about story ideas getting stale. The solution that I came up with was to totally reboot the setting (and find a way to write Vic interacting with the others, which I’ve always wanted to do), and here we are. I realize that this premise is quite a lot darker than my previous work, and I appreciate anyone who’s stuck through to the end of the story, but I also want to recognize that the topic may not be for everyone. From here on out, though, it’ll be mostly lighthearted/humorous stories, just with the background of a different plane of reality than the one we live on.
> 
> The afterlife I’m illustrating here isn’t based off of one particular foundation (I took a few ideas from The Good Place, but other than that it’s mostly of my own creation). I belong to a religion that does not have a clear prescription of what happens after death, and I’ve always been fascinated by the idea of world-building my very own afterlife, so this story is sort of here to satisfy that in addition to my inability to stop writing about these characters. 
> 
> Unlike the previous stories I’ve posted here, this one doesn’t have an endpoint that I’m aiming at. I’ll write for it whenever the urge strikes me (if you read stuff I wrote while the series were live, you know this can mean anywhere from nothing for a week to three posts in a day). I love discussing stories with you all, and like all writers, I am, as previously noted, an approval-shaped void, so if you feel so moved, please let me know what you think!


	2. Chapter 2

On the morning of his death, Brian opens his eyes and realizes that he is no longer in bed with Justin. He’s sitting in a spectacularly uncomfortable chair in a drab old-fashioned office. Brian stands up, looks around.

“Good morning, Mr. Kinney,” a young woman in a suit says to his left, and he jumps.

“The fuck-” Brian says, and then stops, frowning. He sits back down.

The woman smiles pleasantly at him.

“Care to explain why my subconscious decided to build me this incredibly uninteresting dream?” he says, trying for derisive, also trying not to think about how the aches and pains he’s grown accustomed to over the past decade and a half are gone, how this feels much more coherent than any dream he’s ever had.

“I’m afraid this isn’t inside your head, Mr. Kinney,” the woman says. “I’m sorry to tell you that you died earlier this morning.”

Brian stares at her, then looks down at himself, then looks back up.

“Well, I’m sorry to tell _you_ that I don’t feel especially dead,” he says.

She laughs, politely. In a small corner of his mind, Brian wonders how many times she’s heard that.

“Your existence has ceased on earth,” she says, “and now you’re beginning a new one here.”

“And here is...” Brian says, biting his lip.

“Not your mother’s concept of hell, if that’s what you’re asking,” the woman says, and he stares at her. “Not her Christian heaven, either. This is ... a place where people can spend as much time as they want living at peace.”

Brian nods like he understands whatever the fuck that’s supposed to mean, which seems to satisfy the woman. She leads him to a bank of elevators, and just before they enter the nearest one, he stops.

“Not that I really believe this isn’t some fucked-up dream,” Brian says - not completely true, but if the king of self-denial didn’t deny this, was it even happening? - “but, assuming I am, as you’ve said, dead ... Will I see him again?”

The woman doesn’t ask him who he means. “One day, yes,” she says. “And until then, you’ll be able to watch over his life on earth. But we’re getting a bit ahead of ourselves.”

When he sees Debbie in the lobby, flamboyant as ever, Brian bursts into tears. He tries to cut it out, mortified, but she just gathers him into a mother’s embrace and holds him until he can breathe again.

Chattering even faster than he remembers, Debbie leads him through the frozen city, explaining a million things about the world they’re in, the huge scale of it, the living spaces tailored for each resident. “Your place looks like an ice cube on the beach,” she says. “You’ll love it.”

When they get inside the house - he does love it, in fact, although he tries not to show it too enthusiastically - Brian says, “The, uh, office lady said that I could watch over Justin,” and Debbie looks at him with something like pride. Then her expression goes sad, and she says, “You can, but I don’t know if now is-” 

“I don’t care,” Brian says, steely, a trace of his old wounded-animal defensiveness showing through, and Debbie sighs and waves her hand in a way that makes a bright rectangle come out of the air.

Justin is there in their bed, cradling Brian to himself, whispering his name, tears tracking down his face, and Brian curses and looks away as Debbie makes the screen disappear and moves to hold him again as he fights back a scream, wishing more than anything to be able to comfort Justin one last time, hating how powerless he feels.

They spend the time-stop week talking, sometimes stoned, sometimes not, and Deb catches him up on everything that’s been going on in the land of the dead. She and Vic run a café in the city’s downtown - Brian shudders viscerally at the thought of what the decor must be like - and Ted and Blake, inveterate do-gooders that they are, have started some kind of local queers-only therapy group as well as working at the arrival center building thing, greeting souls.

He asks about his parents once, and Debbie shows him how to look people up in a floating directory. Both of them are still stuck in the de-bigoting school, as Deb calls it. He can’t bring himself to feel too bad about that.

Brian tries a lot of new things before Justin arrives. First of all, there are lots of novel and fascinating drugs to try at the best local club, which is just a few blocks away from the house. He would have said that their safety - no addiction in the afterlife, and you can’t die of an overdose if you’re already dead - might take some of the fun out of the experience, but it turns out that E is E regardless of what metaphysical plane you reside on. 

He tries to paint in the room he’s setting up as Justin’s studio and discovers immediately that he has absolutely no patience for it. He teaches himself to cook, basic things, really, and a few that could theoretically serve as romantic dinners, learned from a cookbook he’d been hiding - from _himself_ , until he realized how stupid that was. He arranges the house into a perfect blend of the condo in New York and the beach house in Provincetown, with just a touch of the lavish European hotel rooms where they’d spent so many passionately carnal nights. He isn’t lonely, not really, not with every dead person he knows refusing to stop checking in on him, but he doesn’t bother to pretend that he isn’t preparing the house for Justin. He never even sleeps on his side of the bed.

One day, much to his disgust and Vic’s hilarity, he accidentally causes a litter of newly arrived kittens to imprint on him when they materialize in the sagebrush outside the house. They follow him around for two weeks and eventually become a strange fixture of the beach neighborhood, a pack of friendly strays growing to full cat adulthood (he thinks - they’re less insufferably cute and fluffy now, anyway) before they stop aging. 

He tries celibacy for a year - a _year_ \- because of a drunken bet with Melanie, who is oddly much more tolerable now that they’re both dead. His main takeaway from the experience is that he likes sex far too much to ever try to be a monk.

He hangs out with Ben a lot more than he’d have expected - the guy is still annoyingly zen and still teaches literature (eternal paradise, and _that’s_ what he’s doing with it?) but with Michael and Justin still on earth, they have a certain amount of shared grief to bond over.

Having the ability to change his age everywhere from twenty-one to eighty-five changes his perspective on youth. A little. He spends a while in his twenty-three-year-old body, what he remembered as his physical prime, but the club boys don’t bow down to him any more or less than they do at any other age, and he doesn’t like the memories that come up when he sees himself in the mirror. Eventually, he chooses how he looked on the first day Justin was willing to try the drawing computer, the first time he can remember knowing absolutely that he had done something right. The real surprise comes when they offer him the opportunity to have two flesh-and-blood balls again, and he realizes he doesn’t want it, that he needs some reminder of his past mortality to ground him in the person he eventually grew to like back on earth.

He checks in on Justin at least once a week, just to see how he’s doing. He attends his own funeral - bad idea - and has to go get shitfaced with Jennifer afterward. Justin gets a boyfriend a few years in, a quiet, kind artist, a good fit for him, and Brian considers it remarkable personal growth that he doesn’t even think seriously about drowning himself in mind-altering substances when he finds out, not a trace of the terror of losing Justin that he once had. He knows better than anyone that Justin’s capacity for love can hold much more than him alone. He meets the boyfriend’s dead husband soon after, doesn’t fuck him (he’s waiting for Asher, which Brian almost understands in a way that distantly horrifies him) and invites him to a weekly dinner at Deb and Carl’s because Brian is pathetic now and the guy seems kind of lonely.

Michael shows up three and a half years after Brian dies. Ben nearly runs right into him on the street one day, and when Brian asks what the hurry is, Ben just says, hoarsely, “He’s here,” and then adds, “Meet us at our place,” before sprinting to the bus station.

It takes Brian only a few minutes to drive over to Ben’s (and Michael’s, now) horrifically pleasant suburban home, and by the time he’s arrived the two of them are sitting out on the front step, beaming, arms around each other, post-arrival week already over.

His reunion with Michael is, frankly, fairly embarrassing - there’s a lot of tears and hugging and declarations of everlasting best-friendship, and only about eighty-five percent of them come from Mikey. Brian does his best not to think too hard about that, just like how he’s trying not to be jealous of the blissful touchy-feely love that emanates continuously from Michael and Ben now.

Then one day, as he’s sitting on the roof of the house with a cappuccino and a magazine, the all-white cat perched like a weird sentry on the corner of the deck, he gets a call that he’s been selected as the welcoming committee (not the words they use, but that’s what they mean) for an arriving soul (also, when the _fuck_ did “soul” become a part of his daily vocabulary?). He opens the window onto Justin’s life, and there’s nothing there - not a note saying that the view is unavailable, he gets that sometimes when Justin is in one of his moods or fucking his boyfriend; now there’s just black-and-white static. Brian runs to the corner transit station, just barely making it through the closing doors of a departing bus, and when he gets into the lobby he paces in frantic circles, waiting for the elevator doors to open. He’s done this once before, as Lindsay’s “guide”, but that was years ago, and he’s desperately trying to remember how long it took for her to arrive.

Then there’s a soft chime from the elevator bank, and the doors slide open, and it’s him, Justin, oh, God, so beautiful, eyes widening, running towards him as Brian makes up what’s left of the distance between them. They kiss and hold each other, bodies turned to live wires, needing to touch at every place possible. 

Being back in Justin’s arms is pleasure and luxury beyond anything Brian’s ever imagined. It turns his world on its head, how good it is, how _right_. They fuck like horny teenagers, drunk on the strength and responsiveness of their recreated bodies, for their grace week, ravenous, making up for all their time apart, interspersed with the moments of quiet conversation that Brian has missed so much. It feels like being stabbed in the heart in the best way possible. Justin draws in bed, in the living room, in his studio for hours on end, cooks them meals Brian hasn’t tasted in ten years, makes fun of him for replacing him with six stray cats. 

“They’re not allowed inside the house,” Brian argues, feebly.

Justin looks over at the sunporch, where the tuxedo cat is sunning himself under the windows. “I can see that,” he says, laughing.

 _Fuck_ , Brian thinks. He’s so happy he could probably die from it, if not for the obvious logistical problems.

On the last day of Justin’s first week there, Brian wakes up holding his warm sleeping body. He smiles down at Justin when his eyes blink open, pulling him in for an obscenely indulgent kiss.

“So,” Justin murmurs, stroking his chest with one hand. “Tomorrow.”

Brian nods. “Are you feeling all right?”

Justin gives him a breathtaking smile before kissing him again. “You have no idea how all right.”

“Actually,” Brian says, nuzzling along his neck and into his hair, greedy for the scent of him, “I’m pretty sure I do.”


	3. Chapter 3

As he’s taking the bus to the arrivals building, cursing the car-free urban-utopia layout of the city, Brian makes a single phone call. He should really make more; Deb in particular is going to rip him a new one for it, but his fingers are shaking so badly that it’s a miracle he’s even able to dial this one critical number before the bus stops. 

Jennifer picks up almost immediately. “Brian?”

Brian can’t speak for a moment, just breathes hard, feeling like he’s floating outside his body. Jennifer gasps, the Taylor mind-reading kicking in.

“Is he-” she whispers, and gravity takes over again, dropping Brian back into bustling reality.

“I think so,” he says, and just hearing the words out loud makes it feel like all of his blood has evaporated. “Meet us at the house?”

“Yes,” she says, voice cracking, and he squeezes the phone hard enough to leave indentations on either side of his palm. The bus glides to a halt outside the arrival center, and Brian hangs up as he runs out the doors. 

Now he and Justin have an hour left before they rejoin the normal flow of time, so they fuck once more, slow and luxurious, kissing hungrily the whole time, take a giddy playful shower afterwards, and then get dressed before walking to the living room, holding hands, lounging together on the couch and looking out at the ocean, just relaxing in each other’s company for their last minutes of solitude.

Then the doorbell rings. Jennifer has a key, but Brian figures she’s trying to avoid having the first time she sees her son in decades be while he’s fucking his husband. Probably wise, actually, he thinks, as he watches Justin’s head swivel to the door.

“That’ll be your mom,” he says, and Justin gasps, frozen to the cushions. “I called her while I was going to get you.”

Justin looks unsteady, eyes wide, so Brian helps him up, puts an arm around him as they walk to the door. 

Jennifer has is wringing her hands with the same fine-boned elegance that Justin always has, no matter what he’s on or who he’s doing. When Brian opens the door, she and Justin stare at each other for a moment, and then she runs forward and embraces him, and he closes his eyes and lets her hold him, not bothering to wipe the tears from his cheeks. 

“Hi, mom,” Justin says, still wet-eyed, when she steps back to look at him. She’s so much what he remembers, the sight of her beginning to wash away the deep-seated grief from her death that he’s been carrying for a quarter of a century. 

“Hi, honey,” she whispers back, tripping forward to hug him again. 

Brian steps forward from his position behind the threshold. “I should go tell everyone else I didn’t call earlier,” he says. “Why don’t you two go in and catch up?”

Justin kisses him, firmly, hands on either side of his face. “Don’t be too long, okay?” he murmurs, when he pulls away.

Brian grins, bumps Justin’s nose with his own. “Don’t worry. I have to make sure you two crazy kids haven’t burned the house down, right?”

Justin swats him on the shoulder, beaming, and Jennifer mouths _Thank you_ at him as he lopes away. Brian just grins back, jogging around to the driver’s side of the car - a 1998 black open-top Jeep, his one concession to his memories of his younger self - before squealing out onto the broad road above the beach. Justin watches until the car disappears, smiling faintly. It is the first time they’ve been more than ten feet apart since their reunion.

Then he looks back to his mother, feeling his eyes sting again. “Do- do you want to come in?” he says, strange formality, but she just smiles and loops her arm through his as they walk down to the living room area.

He looks older, that’s the thing Jennifer can’t stop thinking about. Even in his new youthful body, there’s a depth to his eyes she never saw while she was alive, that boyish air he’d always carried, even at forty, sixty, even, now faded somehow.

They sit together on the sofa, hand in hand. “I...” Justin says, quiet. “I don’t know what to say. This keeps happening.”

Jennifer smiles at him. “It happens to everyone. It’s still not really real, right?”

He nods, eyes closing for just a moment. “I never thought I’d see you again,” he whispers finally, and she hugs him close, tears stinging her own eyes as he cries softly against her shoulder.

Justin pulls back, wiping his eyes, smiling again. “So you’ve been- here? There’s so much I need to catch up on. Christ.”

Jennifer takes his hands again. “It’s been wonderful, really. Tucker’s here now too, and I wasn’t sure for a while if we’d work out - he remarried on earth, you probably knew that-”

Justin nods. “But you’re together now?”

“I’m even friends with the other woman he married,” Jennifer says. “I’m very lucky, some don’t have it that easy.”

“And he’s good to you?”

Jennifer rolls her eyes, smiling. “Yes,” she says, jokingly exasperated. “I’ve been dead for almost thirty years, you’d think I could take care of myself by now.”

Justin laughs, feeling a little bit like someone else has taken over his body, still floating in disbelief. “Sorry. Just habit, I guess.”

“You’re a good son,” Jennifer says, and suddenly he’s fighting back tears again, so he leans against her and she puts an arm around his shoulders, and they watch the waves for a while, not speaking.

When he can talk again, Justin says, “And the others, they’re doing well?”

She nods. “Most of them are still living pretty much as they did on earth. Debbie and Carl, Michael and Ben, Ted and Blake, they’re all still together. And Emmett and Duncan too, although-”

“George,” Justin says, suddenly. “God. That must have been hard.”

She nods. “He and Emmett are good friends, now, but I know it was hard on both of them, watching each other fall in love with other people. But everything’s been all right with them for the past few years.”

“That’s good,” Justin says, eyes distant. Then he laughs, a little soft sound. “Fuck. This is so strange.”

Jennifer tightens her arm around him. “I know. As hard as it is to believe now, you’ll get used to it eventually.”

Then she looks at him. “And I’m glad you found someone to be with on earth after Brian - I know he is, too.”

Justin sighs, looking ahead. “I feel guilty, you know? I love Asher, and he’s in pain, and I wish I could let him know that everything will be fine. And I miss him. I’d never had someone who I could create with before, not like we did, just spending time together doing what we loved.”

She smiles, a little wan. “I know how you feel. But he’ll be here soon enough - you’ll be shocked how fast time goes by when you have as much of it as you want.”

Justin smiles back, softly, still not looking right at her. “He’ll be so happy to be with Jordan again. We talked about it once in a while, just daydreams, you know. Being reunited with them. I never imagined it’d come true.”

Jennifer just holds him for a moment, watching him. “I haven’t seen Brian look that happy since he’s been here,” she says.

Justin turns to her. “Has he been- all right? He can get a little-”

“He’s been fine, surprisingly enough,” she says, and he laughs. “That’s good,” he says. “I thought he seemed good, but you never know with him.”

“I didn’t know-” she says, and stops. “I don’t think I knew, before he got here, just how much he adores you. That he’d do absolutely anything for you.”

He nods, a little distant again. “It’s hard to comprehend, sometimes. It took me a long time to believe it.”

“It’s so good to see the two of you together again,” she says, and he smiles and squeezes her hand. 

Then he sits up, frowning, just slightly. “And is Dad-”

Jennifer shakes her head. “Still in the, uh, the other place. It takes a while, for most of them.”

“How long?”

She closes her eyes for a second before speaking. “Hundreds of years, sometimes. Thousands, for some, I’ve heard.”

Justin hasn’t cried over his father in years, but now he feels as if he might. He shuts his eyes, tight, against the tears he feels swimming in them, and Jennifer holds him close while he draws shuddery breaths, trying to rein in a whole host of feelings that he thought he’d dealt with eons ago. 

Then they’re interrupted by, of all things, one of the cats. It’s the big fluffy one, jumping up onto the couch with a cheerful _mrrrrrp_ and curling up happily on Jennifer’s lap.

Justin laughs, a little watery, looking curiously at the cat. “How did you get in?”

“They just do,” Jennifer says, scratching the cat under his chin. “It drives Brian crazy, but they all love him. You should have seen it when they first showed up as kittens, always marching along in a line after him, like little soldiers.”

At that image, Justin bursts into a fit of giggles. “Please tell me there are photos.”

“Vic has some. He thought it was the funniest thing he’d ever seen.”

“I can’t even imagine-” Justin says, before being overcome with laughter again. “ _Kittens_?”

“Every straight woman in the town was falling over themselves for him,” Jennifer says, laughing too, and Justin doubles over with even more giggles. “It completely destroyed his whole bad boy image for everyone in the neighborhood.”

“I bet Debbie loved that,” Justin says, finally able to speak. “God, _Debbie_. I can’t wait to see her, Jesus, all of them.”

Jennifer smiles at him. “I have a feeling you’ll be getting your wish sooner rather than later.”

***

There’s a huge goofy smile glued to Brian’s face as the car soars along the road, sunlight glinting off the ocean to the side, but he can’t be bothered to be even a little irritated by it. He’s known that he belongs to Justin for what feels like forever, and he’d still somehow forgotten just how _good_ it is to see that look of fierce passionate love blazing in Justin’s eyes. Brian has a job to do right now, but if he wasn’t the semi-responsible citizen he’d morphed into sometime in the last fifty years, he’d just drive out to one of the beach overlooks and stretch out in the backseat of the car under the sun, reveling in the well-fucked aches all over his body and thinking disgustingly dreamy thoughts about all the glorious filthy sex they’re going to have tonight.

Brian wants to be inside him right now, he realizes - no big surprise there, but it’s a want that he can’t ignore in a way he hasn’t felt since he was alive. He wants to put Justin’s legs up on his shoulders and feel his desperate quivery moans as he pushes into him, and then to take his face in his hands and drive him crazy with slow-burning kisses as he fucks him so hard he’ll feel it in his throat, the dirtiest making-out imaginable. He wants, absurdly, to call Justin and tell him he loves him, hear his soft amused voice. He wants to pin him against the door of their house and suck him off until he screams, then lie with him on the sofa in perfect beautiful contentedness, watching the sun set over the ocean or some other romantic shit like that.

But Justin is talking to his mother for the first time in decades and Brian, as previously noted, has a job to do, so he coaxes away his hard-on as he drives and thinks instead of how he’s going to tell the others.

Debbie knows the moment he walks into the Pink Lady. She’ll never tell him, but she knows, because Brian loses his usual aura of sex and power whenever something happens to Justin, as though he forgets to divert a certain amount of energy towards walking and looking and talking just right. 

So she just calmly stacks the last few dirty dishes and turns to face him. 

Brian stops, hands in his pockets, just over the threshold. “Justin’s here,” he says, quiet, not at all like himself, and that’s when Debbie lets herself react, running over to hug him, and he doesn’t even protest, just lets her hold him. 

She steps back to see that he’s smiling the soft warm smile she hasn’t seen in years. “Can we- is he ready to see us?” she whispers, and he nods, so she yells to the back for Vic.

“Jason, honey, can you take things from here?” she says, looking behind the counter, and Jason nods, smiling. “Go ahead,” he says. “I’ve got this.”

She kisses him on the cheek. “Bless you, hon.” Then Vic emerges from the kitchen, flowery apron and all, followed by Emmett, who must have just shown up, she didn’t even see him come in, and she wrings her hands, not knowing quite what to do with herself - she’s always had a special soft spot for Justin, has waited for this day for so long-

Brian still has that small shy smile on his face, and when he gets to the front of the café, Emmett takes in a sudden deep breath, bracing himself against the pastry case. “Is- is he-” he says, and Brian nods, and Vic smiles, broadly, having greeted more old dead friends than any of them likely ever will, and says, “Well, what are we still doing here?”

Brian barely says anything on the ride over, none of them do, but he’s steady and glowing with happiness in a way that makes Debbie want to tell him how proud she is of the man he’s grown into. The Jeep pulls up to the house and the four of them jump out, and then it’s Justin opening the door, Jennifer following behind, and he runs to hug Debbie, and she bursts into tears and clutches him tight to her before Vic and Emmett surround them.

“Good to see you, Sunshine,” she says, hoarsely, when Justin’s been released from his last hug, and he beams at her, beautiful smile just like she remembers. “You too,” he says, warm, looking around at the four of them. “All of you, it’s so good to see you.”

As they walk to the house, Brian jogs up to Justin and tugs him into a quick kiss. “Miss me?” Justin says, smirking, when he pulls away. Brian rolls his eyes, grinning, but kisses him again, longer this time, and Justin laughs. “Christ, one little heart failure and you turn into an honest-to-God romantic,” he says, and Brian doesn’t make a single snarky comment, just slips an arm around his shoulders and kisses his cheek, still smiling.

“Jesus,” Vic whispers behind them. “I thought you were messing with me when you said they’d gone all happy-couple.”

Emmett laughs. “You have no idea,” he says, and Debbie just smiles, feeling one more part of her family slot into place.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> I’m not entirely happy with my own lazy exposition of Emmett’s situation here, so I might write a future flashback chapter fleshing out what exactly his arrival was like at some point.


	4. Chapter 4

Justin can barely remember how they got here, fucking like there’s no tomorrow on the dining room table, but it doesn’t matter, nothing matters but the _feeling_ , Brian ramming into him over and over and over again, face twisted in rage or ecstasy, holding Justin down by his hips to fuck him harder and harder and harder and-

“Nnngh,” Justin moans, eloquently. “OhmygodBrianyesyesohfuckinggodyesharderoh _fuck_ ,” and Brian groans and bends over to lick messily at his mouth, putting his hands on Justin’s shoulders and using them to slam his body down even more roughly against his dick. Justin screams and flails in Brian’s grip, feeling deliciously slutty, out of control, and he’s almost taken by surprise when he comes right then, shuddering and choking on low little gasps, eyes rolling back in his head as Brian just keeps on fucking him through it. 

“Please,” he’s whimpering, now, “please, Brian, fuck-”

Justin isn’t sure what it is he’s praying for. More, maybe. Less, probably not. Brian has his forehead pressed right above Justin’s heart, and he’s still pounding away at him, and Justin is falling in love all over again just from the needy little sounds he’s making as he mouths at Justin’s skin, scraping teeth along his collarbone, tonguing at his nipples. They’re a living sculpture in the afternoon sunlight, skin and sound and fast-pumping blood, and everything is gorgeous sensual pleasure and they’ve been fucking since lunchtime and Justin doesn’t ever want to be doing anything other than this, bodies moving together in a graceful familiar dance even as they snarl and growl with panting open mouths against each other’s necks.

When Brian stands up straight again, it drives him right up into Justin in a way that makes both of them howl, and Justin feels like he’s died and gone to heaven (he needs a new expression for that now, muses the sole brain cell not devoted to his current state of being-fucked-blind-ness) when he starts to come again, nerves twinging as Brian pushes all the way in and spills inside him, gasping, groaning, clutching Justin like a lifeline. Justin rides Brian’s orgasm along with his own, feeling those two searing decadent razor-wire ecstasies weaving together, a thin chain necklace of fiery beautiful delirium encircling them both.

Brian’s hair is mussed into sweaty spikes by the time he stops shaking, and when he drops his head back down, crushing their mouths together in a sloppy vulgar not-kiss, Justin traces them with his fingers, feeling the hard flat table under him and the warm body on top of him and Brian’s hot come dripping out of his sweetly aching ass.

“You’re so fucking hot,” Brian tells him, and Justin grins lazily upward, liquid pale limbs sprawled across the table, obscene satisfaction radiating from his every aspect, and Brian has to pull him up off the table so he can kiss him for real, pushing his tongue into his mouth, licking into him the way he likes to open up his ass, conquering him with soft sure strokes, and Justin moans so delectably that carrying him all the way over to the sofa is an impossibility, so Brian just lays him down gently on the floor so they can suck on each other’s tongues in the relative comfort of the plush gray carpet. 

Then there’s a knock at the door.

“Fuck,” Justin says, pulling him down for another deep dirty kiss before sitting up. “Do we have to answer that?”

“Debatable,” Brian murmurs, lips moving lavishly across Justin’s neck. Justin smiles and lays back down and Brian follows, spent bodies tangling together. It’s already been a little more than two regular weeks since Justin arrived, three if he counts the time-stop period, but Brian is laughably far from being anything but in awe of how spectacularly wonderful it is to have him here. There isn’t a single surface in the house they haven’t fucked on, most of them twice or more, and they have to change the sheets practically daily, and Brian has screwed them both into unconsciousness more than a few times already, and he’s never going to be satisfied at this rate because the more they fuck, the more he _wants_ , and he knows it’s the same for Justin too. He’s spending half his life stoned on unimaginable sex and the other half just dizzyingly in love with the only man he’s ever wanted like this, and Brian didn’t know it was possible to feel this happy and exhausted and greedy for more, all at the same time. “You feel so good,” he breathes, nipping at Justin’s ear, down to his jaw, ruffling his hair.

Justin is about to respond when Debbie yells, “I know you’re in there, boys, so open up!” from the other side of the door.

“Fuck,” Brian says, flopping onto his back next to Justin. He gives him one more quick kiss, smiling softly, and then walks to the door, retrieving his jeans from the back of the couch as he goes. Justin looks around until he finds his sweats and one of Brian’s shirts, and he’s just barely gotten dressed when Debbie bursts through the door, Pyrex dish in hand.

“I made too much lasagna,” she says, walking towards the kitchen. Behind her, Brian and Justin exchange a look - there’s no such thing as too much lasagna in the Novotny-Horvath household, and all three of them know it - before following. 

She puts the dish in the fridge, then turns around. “We missed you two at Sunday dinner last week, by the way.”

 _Ah_ , Brian thinks.

 _Oops_ , Justin thinks.

“Yeah, sorry about that,” Brian says, trying for sincere. “We were-” _fucking each other raw over and over and over again in sticky, sweaty sheets, coming so many times that the last few were more pain than pleasure, and when I spent a whole hour rimming Justin he actually_ cried _when he came, actual wet salty_ tears _dripping on to the pillow, and it was the hottest fucking thing I’ve ever seen, I’ll be thinking about his perfect flushed desperate face every time I jerk off for the next thousand years_ “-busy.”

“We’ll make sure to-” _set an alarm so we don’t fuck ourselves into oblivion and lose three whole days to nothing but gluttonously indulgent sex, wrecking any concept of a circadian rhythm, sleeping when we’re too tired to fuck or eat, hours spent just kissing, writhing together in wonderful harmonious bliss, Brian looking at me with that gorgeous vulnerable expression of bone-deep love and need and devotion as I fucked him so excruciatingly slow and hard that he was out-and-out begging by the end_ “-be there next week,” Justin says, beaming at her with his Sunshiniest smile.

After Debbie leaves, Justin pushes Brian onto the sofa, spilling his long lean body all over the cushions, unbuttoning his jeans as he devours his mouth, then winks up at him before swallowing his cock whole. Brian looks at him until the image of Justin on his knees, beautiful soft lips stretching around his dick, gets to be too much, and then he just lets his head fall back into the cushions while Justin works his magic.

They have reheated lasagna for dinner, not even bothering with plates, just sitting shoulder-to-shoulder, two forks and the Pyrex on a potholder on the same table they’d been fucking on earlier.

“Do you think we’re having too much sex?” Justin says, absently, licking a stray sliver of pasta off his fork. Brian doesn’t answer for a moment, distracted by the sinuous movement of Justin’s tongue along the steel. The he registers the question and snorts. “There’s no such thing as too much sex,” he says, exactly as Justin knew he would, and they look at each other and laugh, at themselves, partially, and at the rest of the world as well.

Justin tops when they go to bed that night, pounding Brian as he lies on his back, moaning, low and pleading, for more and more and more, and Justin gives it to him; he’ll give Brian anything he wants like this, that perfect muscular body laid out for him to take, face breathtakingly open, showing every little new bite of pleasure, the effect of each new change of angle. Justin breathes _I love you_ over and over through both their orgasms, and Brian is beautiful afterwards, clinging to him while Justin presses soft kisses all over his face. When he comes back from the bathroom with a warm cloth, Brian is already peacefully asleep, and Justin smiles and cleans him up as best he can without waking him.

The next morning Justin comes awake to see Brian lying on his front, plump tanned ass poking tantalizingly out of the twisted-up sheets. After considering his options, Justin eats him out until he wakes, cursing and spluttering, then lets himself be rolled over and fucked into the next millennium by a now delightfully riled-up Brian. They carry on from there, fucking in bed, then in the shower, midway through breakfast, on the sofa, in Justin’s studio, on the living room carpet, on the kitchen counter, in Brian’s desk chair, sex on sex on sex. Justin will be limping tomorrow, Brian thinks, viciously pleased with the idea, as they pass out that evening, sated for the moment, wrapped around each other on the bedroom floor, too tired to even consider getting into bed.

Unfortunately, that’s not quite how it works out. 

Things are going well, at first. Brian awakens with Justin still close against his chest, soft morning sunlight reflecting off the ocean into their bedroom, and he smiles, strokes Justin’s silky golden hair as he wakes up, endearingly slowly, snuffling drowsily against his skin.

Then Brian tries to sit up. 

“Ow.”

Justin blinks sleep from his eyes, looks curiously down at him. “You okay?”

“Pins and needles,” Brian says, frowning. “I think.”

He tries again. 

“Ow! Fuck, that hurts.”

Justin’s looking concerned now, pulling himself up to the sitting position Brian has been trying to achieve. “Uh-”

“I’m fine,” Brian says. Brian is very definitely not fine, so Justin takes his hands, helps him sit up against the side of the bed. 

“Ow. Shit. Ow.”

Justin looks at him, the way he’s holding his left leg, and a very old memory clicks. He tries to hold it back, he really does, but it’s only about two seconds before he bursts out laughing.

Brian glares at him. “This isn’t funny.”

“No, it really isn’t,” Justin says, still giggling madly. “It’s just that, um, I think-”

“What?”

“I think you have a groin pull,” Justin says, and then chokes on another fit of giggles, hand over his mouth. 

Brian frowns. “That’s a sports injury.”

Justin gets the uncontrollable laughter under control, sort of. “In this case, I think it’s a sex injury.”

“I don’t get-”

“I know that you pride yourself on being such a divine being in bed that you could never hurt yourself having sex-”

Brian hmmphs.

“-but I’m pretty sure that’s what’s happened.” The seventeen-year-old in Justin is jumping up and down at the idea of having given Brian Kinney, stud of Liberty Avenue, a _sex injury_. Justin doesn’t think it would be especially helpful to mention that out loud.

He tries another tactic instead. “You have to admit we’ve been fucking a lot. Even for us.”

Even with a probable muscle strain, Brian manages to look smug about that. Justin rolls his eyes. “Come on, I’ll help you get dressed.”

Justin helps him hobble into the living room and lay down on the sofa. “I’m calling Lindsay,” he says.

Brian scowls. “Don’t bother.”

Rolling his eyes, Justin sits down on the floor so that he can look Brian right in the face. “I am calling Lindsay,” he says, enunciating each word as if he’s talking to a kindergartener, “because she raised two children, so she knows what to do with sprains. Also, she can keep a secret, and all that ingrained WASP training will prevent her from laughing at you. Too much, anyway. Your other options are Debbie, Mel, and Michael. Thoughts?”

Brian groans. “Fine. Call Lindsay.”

Lindsay doesn’t laugh - much - although she does look like she’s trying very hard to contain an amused smile the whole time she’s there. “You need to do RICE,” she tells them. “Rest, ice, compression, elevation. And take a week or so off from anything strenuous, at least.”

“Just kill me now,” Brian says.

“Little late for that,” Justin tells him, grinning, emerging from the kitchen with a bag of frozen peas. “Come on, it’ll be fun. We can watch movies, sit out on the deck ... _cuddle_ ...”

 _I had so many plans for your ass,_ Brian thinks, mournfully, as if they don’t have an entire eternity of time available ahead of them. _And your mouth, and your cock, and your hands, your hair, your beautiful body-_.

Justin is laughing at his expression, which Brian doesn’t think is especially supportive. “You are such a drama queen,” Justin murmurs, fondly, brushing his lips over Brian’s.

Lindsay eventually leaves, after giving Justin enough advice to fill several sticky notes (which he does, of course, dutifully recording everything she says in his artist’s scrawl). Then he comes over to lie on his side next to Brian, who’s still holding the bag of peas to his aching inner thigh. 

“Want to watch a movie or something?” Justin asks him, snuggling up to him, careful not to jar his injured leg.

Brian is surprised to find that he doesn’t have a caustic remark for the situation. “This is nice, actually,” he says, finally, and Justin smiles at him and nuzzles against his chin.

“Sorry I won’t be able to fuck you the way we’ve been doing for a while,” Brian says, after a few minutes, and Justin stares at him.

“ _That’s_ what you’re worried about? Christ, Brian, we’ve had much worse than a few weeks of gentle sex.”

Brian smiles, a touch self-consciously, and Justin gives him little affectionate kisses in return, bumping their noses together as he does.

“Maybe we should get you one of those mindfulness tapes,” Justin says. “ _You are more than your penis_ ,” he intones, grinning. “ _Your penis is a part of you, a very nice part of you, but it is just that: a part, not all of you_.” 

Brian can’t help but laugh. “Sunshine,” he murmurs, “why would I need tapes when I’ve got you?”


	5. Chapter 5

The house seems different already, Debbie thinks as she follows their little group up to the front door, still wiping tears from her eyes, watching Justin, marveling at how good it is to have the last of her sons back. There’s a vitality to it, a hint of joyful chaos, Justin’s mark, that she remembers so well from when he lived with her (less fondly, she thinks, with a rueful smile, given the number of socks she’d collected daily from odd places in the living room). He and Brian are glowing with happiness, holding hands, Vic and Emmett’s newlywed jokes bouncing right off of them. When Debbie reaches the threshold, Jennifer hugs her with fierce elation, more than a few tears notwithstanding.

They sit together in the living room, talking, laughing, the newcomers doing their best not to stare too much at Justin (Brian, though, hasn’t stopped looking at him for more than a few seconds since they all arrived, something that Debbie studiously does not make any jokes about).

Just before evening starts to fall, Vic says, to Justin, “If you’re up for it, Rodney and I are having everyone over for dinner tonight, and all the others should be there.”

Brian puts a protective arm around Justin’s shoulders, but Justin gives him a look, then smiles at Vic. “I’d love to come,” he says. “Thank you.”

The others leave a little while later, each making some polite excuse, transparently wanting to give Justin and Brian some space before the dinner. Jennifer is last to go, hugging both of them tightly. She holds Justin the longest, until he laughs, telling her they’ll see her in an hour, and she smiles back and kisses him on the forehead before walking back down the path to her gleaming blue BMW coupe, turning back more than once to wave at the two of them, backlit in the doorway.

When her car rounds the corner, disappearing from sight, Justin turns around and looks at Brian with something terrifyingly fragile in his expression, and Brian nearly runs to catch him, clutching him close, solid warm body grounding him. 

“It’s okay, it’s okay, it’s okay,” he whispers, nonsensically, rubbing Justin’s back as he trembles, Brian’s arms around him the only thing keeping him from flying apart. 

“I don’t know why-” Justin says, and stops. “It just hit me. All at once. I’m _dead_ , Brian, we’re all dead, and I’ll never be in New York again, Pittsburgh, Venice, Madrid - the world can’t be gone, just like that, can it?”

Brian noses along his jaw, taking a deep steadying breath of him. He draws back with wet red eyes, taking Justin’s face in his hands. “I feel the same way sometimes,” he says, almost whispering. “I miss our old world too. I think most people do.”

Justin sighs, shuddery, still damp, and Brian kisses his temple, warm soft lips replenishing something inside him that he hadn’t known had run dry.

He looks up, runs one hand through Brian’s gorgeous tousled hair. Then he smiles, gently, traces a shadow on his cheek, fingertips brushing across his mouth. “I would give it all up again for this, though,” he says. “For you.”

Brian makes a soft sound and kisses him, hungry, needy. “Me too, Sunshine,” he whispers, Justin’s heartbeat pulsing under his fingertips. “You already know it, but whatever world has you in it, that’s where I want to be.”

***

Vic and Rodney live in a townhouse on the outskirts of the beach city, Brian tells him as they drive over, holding hands across the center console, Justin tipping his head back, drinking in the ocean air.

“Why do you think we ended up in a house, not in the middle of the city?” Justin says. 

Brian shrugs. “Maybe they knew we’d like a little space to ourselves, not so crowded.” He looks over. “Would you rather we were right in the middle of things?”

Justin smiles, leans his head on Brian’s shoulder, feeling the night wind ruffle through his hair. “Not even a little bit,” he murmurs. “Close to everything and still in our own private paradise? I couldn’t imagine anything better.” Brian smiles, takes his eyes off the road just for a moment to kiss him on the cheek before turning back.

The moment they walk into the entranceway, Justin is ambushed by a crowd of their friends, Lindsay, first, then Michael, crying - like mother, like son, Justin thinks, smiling internally, and all the others right behind, Brian playing protector, keeping them from overwhelming him all at once. 

When he finally makes it through the throng of familiar faces, a young man with neat short-clipped hair greets him by name, and Justin nearly jumps out of his skin when he realizes how he knows the man’s face. 

“Jason Kemp?” he says, eyes wide, and Jason nods, smiling. “It’s so good to finally meet you,” he says, holding out a hand. Justin shakes it, then glances back at Brian, who’s looking sheepish. 

“Forgot to mention a few things, huh?” Justin mutters, when Debbie hauls Jason back into the kitchen to help with something or other. Brian smiles, nearly apologetic, bumps their faces together. “Can you blame me?” he says, slipping an arm around Justin’s waist. “I’ve been a little distracted over the past week.”

A tall man Justin doesn’t think he knows emerges from the kitchen, saying something about a cauliflower soufflé. When he sees Justin, he stops dead.

Brian steps forward. “Jordan, this is-” he says, and that’s as far as he gets before Jordan - _Asher’s husband_ Jordan, he must be - walks over and folds Justin into a warm tight hug.

“Thank you for taking care of him,” he whispers, and Justin hugs him back, unable to speak, not knowing what to say if he could, eyes closed.

“I’m sorry,” he says, finally, when Jordan steps back, but he shakes his head, smiling - he’s a multifaith minister, Justin remembers suddenly, “spiritually aligned,” Asher used to call him. “He’ll be here soon enough,” Jordan says. “I’m just glad he wasn’t alone all this time.”

Brian presses his lips to Justin’s hair, swimming in the sweet lively warmth radiating from his very-much-alive body. “So am I,” he says, softly, and Jordan just smiles at the two of them, turning to lead them through to the bustling dining room.


	6. Chapter 6

“Have you ever tried paczki?”

Justin looks up from the canvas he’s sketching on. “Huh?”

Brian walks over to him, smiling, and kisses his neck, arms coming around him from behind. “I have that new client, the bakery that just opened downtown? Their specialty is paczki. Polish doughnuts.” He holds up a paper bag and grins. “Sin in a pastry. Feel like a break from being an artistic genius?”

Justin grins. “I love you,” he sighs, only a little bit exaggerated, grinding back against Brian and turning his head to kiss him sloppily, tongues dancing together. Brian laughs and tugs him out of the studio.

They eat on the deck, watching the tide creep up the beach while the calico cat sleeps in a neat loaf, paws tucked under her, on one of the railings. 

“So what’s the new project?” Brian says.

Justin looks at him. “How did you know I’m working on something new?”

Brian gives his shoulder an affectionate bump. “Because whenever you start a project, you don’t talk for hours at a time. It’s very noticeable.”

Grinning, Justin punches him in the arm. Then his face goes more serious. “It’s this idea I had when I was talking with Blake last week. You know how he and Ted run that therapy group for queer arrivals who died violently?”

Brian hadn’t exactly known that, actually, had just mentally labeled the group as “depressing” and forgotten any details, but he nods.

“One of the things they do is help people process what happened to them by watching the moment they died in a controlled environment, with trained counselors there ready to step in.”

“Jesus _Christ_.”

“It sounds intense, I know, and it is, but that’s the whole point. So what I want to do is create a portrait series of anyone who’s willing, group members who are doing this process, especially ones who died in hate crimes, and paint them before, during, and after they watch their deaths and talk about it with the group.”

Brian’s staring at him, horrified. Justin puts a hand on his. “It’s heavy, really heavy, but I’ve been attending some open sessions recently and I think it could be amazing, the best work I’ve ever done. Blake does too. He’s hoping it’ll raise awareness for the group, maybe even encourage people to join.”

Justin’s phone rings, and he dusts the last of the powdered sugar off his hands and looks at the screen. “Blake,” he says. “I have to go take this. Thanks for the doughnuts.” He smiles and kisses Brian on the cheek, then jogs back into the house, answering the call as he does.

The moment Justin’s out of earshot, Brian calls Ted.

“What the _fuck_ were you and Blake thinking, getting Justin involved in this?” he hisses, not bothering with “hello”.

Ted sighs. “Justin was worried you might react like this,” he says. “He can handle it.”

“You know nothing about what he can handle,” Brian says, teeth gritted. “You haven’t seen him- wake up screaming from nightmares, turning into a whole different person just because someone bumps into him on the street. No one knows what that’s like, not you, not _Blake_ , not anyone. No one but me.”

“And him,” Ted says, voice suddenly hard. “I’m pretty sure Justin knows it too.”

“Fuck off,” Brian snaps. Next to him, the calico cat unfolds herself, then sits down again in a much more severe pose, tail coiled around her front paws. 

“This is important to him, Brian,” Ted says. “And if you have concerns, you should be talking to him about them, not me.”

Brian considers explaining that there’s nothing to talk about, that Justin’s stubbornness and bravery, usually things he loves, mean that he’ll run headlong into this stupid fucking project until it breaks him.

“I’m not sure this is really about him, anyway,” Ted continues. “I think this might be more about you.”

“Fuck,” Brian says, “ _off_.” He hangs up.

The calico cat is staring at him. “What the fuck are you looking at?” he snarls. When she doesn’t move, he balls up the paper bakery bag and throws it at her, and she’s gone in a sleek flash of fur.

***

The next afternoon, there are sketches on the kitchen counter, grids that Brian recognizes as layout plans for paintings.

“So you’re really going ahead with this?” he says, when Justin comes over, pencil and sketchbook in hand.

Justin shrugs. “I think it could be a healthy way for me to work through some of the feelings I have, and if I can help the others with that too, that’s even better.”

Brian looks at him. “Yeah, but what if you-” He sighs. “What if you end up back in that- place, where you were after Darren got bashed? After you did?”

“That was forever ago,” Justin says. “I’m much better equipped to deal with it now, and Blake will be there to mediate too, make sure we’re all staying in a healthy frame of mind while we watch the memories, talk about them afterwards.”

“You think he’ll be able to do that, with something like this?”

Justin nods. “I know he will. One of the guys had a panic attack at the last open session, and Blake was amazing, talking him through it and-”

“Someone had a panic attack?” Brian asks, voice flat. “While you were there?”

“It’s something we’re prepared for,” Justin says, fiddling with the pencil. “It’s the darkest moments of these people’s lives. Reactions, emotions in the room, it’ll definitely be ... intense. That’s the whole point.”

“But being exposed to that all the time-” Brian says, jaw twitching. “I _told_ Ted this was a bad idea, I knew it would end up like-”

Justin stares at him. “You _what_?”

Brian looks a little ashamed, good for him, but Justin is starting to feel that old familiar furious frustration boiling up. “You didn’t say you’d talked to Ted about this. You went behind my back?”

“I was worried,” Brian says. “About you, about this project, what it could make you feel-”

“I just-” Justin says, and pauses, fuming. “I don’t understand why you always try to shield me from shit like this. You know very fucking well that I can take care of myself.”

Brian stands up, shoulders set in anger, and paces towards the windows overlooking the ocean before coming back. “Yeah. I _know_ ,” he says, looking at a spot just above Justin’s head. “You don’t need me, you don’t _need_ anyone.”

Justin makes a frustrated noise, throwing his arms out to the sides. “So why don’t you act like it?”

“Why don’t I- why don’t I _act_ like it?” Brian says, really gathering steam now. “I don’t know, maybe because I worry that every time I look away there’ll be some new surprise there to hurt you? Maybe because you had enough hurt for a lifetime before you’d even turned nineteen, and I was responsible?” He’s breathing hard, radiating cold flaming bitter rage in a way Justin hasn’t seen in years. 

“Jesus _fucking_ Christ,” Justin spits. “Could you please let go of that martyr’s cross for one goddamn second? Why does it always have to be about you? This is about me, and my independence, my _agency_ , and-”

“It’s not _just_ about you,” Brian says, voice suddenly quiet and dangerous. Justin sneers. “Oh, yeah? In what way is me making my own informed decisions about my life not just about me?”

“BECAUSE I NEED YOU!” Brian roars, and then he just stands there, quiet, a little slumped, fury drained. Justin stares at him, eyes wide, and then he whispers, “Oh,” surprised, soft, and runs forward to clutch Brian tight in a warm desperate embrace. “Oh, Brian,” he says, still in that soft startled voice. Brian buries his face in Justin’s neck, breathes in and out, absorbing him. 

“I can’t- be without you again,” Brian whispers, eyes shut tight. “I can’t do it, Justin, and I know it’s selfish, but I need you to be safe. I need to know that you’re not throwing yourself into things that could destroy you without a second thought.”

Justin nods, the ends of his hair brushing over Brian’s cheek. He loosens his hold just a little and draws back, nudges their noses together, and Brian smiles the sad helpless smile he has when he’s utterly lost and doesn’t know how to say it.

“Okay,” Justin whispers. “Okay, I can do that.” He strokes Brian’s face, looks him right in the eye. “I’m not going to stop working on this, because it’s important and it could really help people, but I promise you, if I start to feel that darkness coming in again, I’ll tell you. Right away.” 

He pauses, brow furrowed. “But Christ, Brian, the next time you’re feeling like this, could you please fucking tell me instead of just snowplowing every obstacle you see out of my way?”

Brian chuckles, wan, and nods. “Deal.”

“Deal,” Justin murmurs back, just a hint of a smile on his lips.

***

Brian is stretched out on the sofa when Justin gets home, one leg bent and one straight, wearing button-fly jeans and a black wifebeater and reading a magazine with a joint in his teeth. It’s been a long day, and Justin hadn’t realized until the moment he walked in that this was exactly what he needed to find, Brian, comfortable and familiar and gorgeous, oozing sex and his unique easy dirty elegance. Justin wants to _lick_ him.

He walks down into the living room and Brian props himself up on his elbows, smiling. 

“You’re back early.”

Justin shrugs. “Wasn’t much to do today. Just introductions, getting to know each other, brainstorming outlines for the project.”

“And you’re-” Brian says, and stops himself.

“I’m okay,” Justin says. “And if I’m ever not, I will tell you. You have my word.”

Brian nods and sits up to tug him into a long deep kiss, and Justin kneels next to the sofa and soaks him in. His thoughts must show on his face, because Brian gives him a slow, filthy grin, so Justin gives one right back before undoing Brian’s fly.

He straddles his legs, plucks the joint from Brian’s lips, takes a deep inhale from it, feeling the edges of the world soften. Then he kisses Brian, once, deeply, and hands the joint back before crawling down to take his cock in his mouth.

Justin normally likes to draw it out a little when he’s blowing Brian, likes the feeling of having him totally at his mercy, but now he just sucks him down hungrily, letting his throat relax, reaching below his chin to fondle Brian’s balls. He brings one of Brian’s hands to the back of his head, encouraging him to thrust into his throat. Brian groans, fisting a hand in Justin’s hair, and starts moving his hips, and when Justin hums contentedly around his cock he arches with uninhibited grace, his other arm thrown up behind his head, over the arm of the sofa.

Justin lets him fuck his throat until he starts making the little stuttery whines that mean he’s close enough to taste it. Then he pulls off, licks one more time over the purpled head of Brian’s cock - Brian curses, hips jerking - and then reaches for the lube in the side table drawer.

Brian opens him fast and rough, tongue in his mouth and one hand on the back of his neck, lithe lean body thrumming with power and lust. 

“Condom?” Brian says, before starting to suck a bruise into Justin’s throat. Justin moans, shakes his head, and Brian grins, sharp, a piranha smile, circles his asshole once more with two slippery fingers, and then guides him onto his dick. 

Justin gasps, high-pitched and a little frantic, as he settles all the way down, full up with cock, leaning forward for a messy wet kiss. Brian puts one hand on the small of his back, keeping him bent in half as he moves faster.

“ _Yes_ ,” Justin sighs, letting himself float on the feeling, almost too good to bear. “Mmmm, _Brian_.”

Brian tightens his grip on Justin’s hair, tilts his head so he can murmur right into his ear. “So fucking hot for me, Sunshine,” he says, lips still in that sharkish grin. “Do you have any idea how crazy it makes me that this, _this_ ” - he snaps his hips up, cruelly hard, and Justin chokes on a scream, hands scrabbling for purchase on Brian’s chest - “is the place where you can let go, relax, just be yourself? Do you have any fucking _clue_ how it feels to come home to you and make your face light up with a pair of handcuffs and my bare cock?” He bites at Justin’s ear, growls, slides the hand on his back down to the juncture of their bodies, traces a finger around Justin’s stretched rim. Justin’s breath hitches in a drunken moan, and he whimpers out _ohfuckBrian_ , and it’s a weird moment to be knocked sideways by a wave of furious urgent love, maybe, but Brian is anyway, bowled over by how he feels for this boy he once picked up a million lifetimes ago. 

“I haven’t done it bareback with anyone else,” he whispers, needing Justin to know it, suddenly, his one secret boundary, the thing that he didn’t decide to do, exactly - as far as maximizing pleasure goes, it lacks logical sense in a world with no diseases - but that he’s done and decided not to think about since the day he arrived. Justin closes his eyes, some unreadable thing crossing his face, and then he’s grabbing Brian by the head and kissing him ravenously, moaning low incoherent desperation into his mouth. When he pulls away, pink lips flushed to red, he’s smiling, looking down with that ferocious inescapable love that Brian will never have enough of. 

Then Justin raises his head again and breathes, trace of a smirk across his mouth, “How about you fuck me like you mean it, then?”

Brian stares at him for a moment, already thrusting hard enough that Justin is bouncing on his thighs with every stroke. Then he snarls and grabs Justin’s shoulders and waist and maneuvers them over, miles from gently, so that Justin is on his back. He puts his hands flat on the sofa, one on either side of Justin’s head, flashes him that animal grin one more time, relishing the tiny little whimper that pulls from him, the almost-apprehensive look on his face.

Then he slams forward so hard that Justin’s hips come clear off the sofa.

Justin howls, head thrown back, an image of pure unbridled need. Brian doesn’t falter in the slightest, just keeps pounding him with punishing force, ramming in hard and fast and pulling out slowly enough to make Justin sob. “Like that?” he says, before biting into Justin’s shoulder, hard. “Yes,” Justin gasps, clawing at him. “Yesyesyesyesyes _fuck_ nnnmpghmmmm.”

Brian isn’t thinking about the kiss, really, too focused on the way Justin is clenching around him, but he puts up a good effort anyway, tongue demanding him, licking to the back of his throat, and Justin just takes it, blissful, sucking on Brian’s tongue, muffling the hurt needy sounds he’s making on every thrust. 

Justin comes hard, his whole body twitching. Brian doesn’t even slow down, just keeps hammering at him, growling, hands gripping his shoulders, now, holding him steady for his cock. Justin whines, only vaguely aware of how pitiful the sound is and not even close to caring. “Please,” he whimpers, voice hoarse. “Please, too much, I, _Brian_ -” and Brian rams into him one more time, pulling out so slowly it hurts, and then jacks himself until he’s coming all over Justin’s abused red hole, hot sticky spurts of it making Justin quiver as Brian looks at him with a kind of hunger that might frighten him if it didn’t make him want to offer up his body as a sacrifice to him. 

Brian ducks down and licks up his own come, tongue rasping between Justin’s cheeks, making him squirm and gasp, covering his face with hands tired from clenching around nothing. Brian slinks back up his body and kisses him, closer to soft this time but certainly not gentle. 

“Good?” he murmurs, and Justin closes his eyes again, laughs, a little. “What do you think?” he says, and Brian chuckles and nuzzles at his cheek, his neck, kissing the bitemarks on his shoulder, soft hair brushing over Justin’s bruised fucked-out mouth. 

“I love you,” Justin whispers, needing to say it, suddenly, to hear the words envelop the two of them. Brian smiles into his neck, lips pursing in a sweet chaste kiss against the skin.

Later that night, as they’re sitting down to dinner, Justin says, “So I had this idea today. And I think it’s something that I need to do, and it might even be good for you too, although I don’t want you to do anything you’re not ready for, but-”

Brian takes his hands, stopping the flow of words before Justin starts to spiral. “It’s okay,” he says, soft, reassuring. “What is it?”

Justin lets out a heavy breath, looking down. “I want to do the therapy myself. With the- when I got bashed.”

Brian’s grip on his hands tightens, and he lifts his head back up. “Like I said, I think it’s something that I need to do. And if ... if you’re in the right place for it, I’d like to do it with you.”

Brian just looks at him for a long moment, Justin’s eyes clear and open down to his soul. 

“Okay,” he says, finally, voice feeling like it’s coming from someone else.

Justin tilts his head. “Okay?”

“I’ll do it,” Brian says. “Or, at least, I’ll try.”

Justin brings one of Brian’s hands to his mouth, kisses his knuckles, eyes closed. “Thank you,” he whispers, and Brian feels- not good about it, not yet, but that he’s made one of those rare right decisions for the both of them.


	7. Chapter 7

Of all his friends, Emmett was one of a small few who stayed a practicing Christian his whole life, poor attendance to actual church notwithstanding (Sundays at ten a.m.? No wonder churches had such a tendency to attract miserable homophobes - everyone interesting, he’d once theorized, would be too hungover to go most of the time). 

Anyway, he’s not unfamiliar, so to speak, with the concept of seeing dead loved ones again someday. But daydreaming about heavenly reunions is a far cry from experiencing them, so when he steps into the arrival lobby and sees Duncan, Emmett reacts exactly as one might naturally expect.

Many minutes and tears and kisses later, Duncan takes his hand and leads him out of the building and takes him home. It’s a seaside cottage, their house, pink-shuttered windows with window boxes overflowing with peonies and geraniums.

“This is-” Emmett says, “it’s like a dream.” He kisses Duncan, pressing up against him, needing to feel him to believe it. “What do you think of the flowers?” Duncan says, smiling, when they separate, such a gentle voice from such a big man. “I tried to put all your favorites, but I think I might have forgotten a few, so I left some empty space where we can plant more if you want.”

“They’re beautiful, baby,” Emmett says, still resting against Duncan’s body, drinking in his warmth. “Perfect.”

They go inside holding hands.

On their second morning there together, after endless wonderful hours of tearful embraces and sweet reverent lovemaking, Duncan sits up in bed and pulls Emmett up next to him, face serious. “I need to tell you something,” he says, and Emmett looks at him, concerned. 

Duncan sighs. “I don’t know where to start. I want you to be happy, all right? I want you to know that.”

Taking his hands, Emmett frowns. “I am happy, can’t you tell? These past two days have been more than I ever could have dreamed of.”

“I- that’s not really what I mean,” Duncan says, still looking sad. Then he seems to steady himself, and he says, “George is here, Em,” and Emmett’s world explodes.

***

Duncan explains everything in a remarkably calm, even voice: George is living in the center of the city, living the fabulous life he always wanted, with strings of beautiful boyfriends trailing behind him, never settling down, seemingly reclaiming his stolen youth. He and Duncan are friends, supposedly, and George is a regular at Vic and Debbie’s café, a friendly drop-in to the Pittsburgh circle.

Emmett is shaking, nearly imperceptibly, and Duncan puts an arm around him, tries to steady him. “I just want you to do what makes you happy,” he says, voice starting to crack, and Emmett wants to either cry or scream, or maybe both at once. “I know that you and he- you didn’t get as much time as you wanted. As you deserved. But I also want you to know that I still love you every bit as much as I did every day we were alive.”

They spend the rest of their time-stop week in alternating moods of euphoria and melancholy, and Emmett begins to see the virtues of the grace period they’ve been given, considering the frequency with which he wants to go find George and- do what?

“I still love you too,” he tells Duncan, once he can speak again, after the initial shock has worn off. “I love you so much, baby. I want to be with you,” and Duncan squeezes his eyes shut and holds Emmett so tight to him, and Emmett feels content, for a moment, and then he starts to think about how he wants to be with George too, in a different way, maybe, more distant, but the pain of it is anything but far away.

When that first week ends, Emmett isn’t ready to see George, he realizes, and so he doesn’t, just greets a few close friends, has a long tearful reunion with Teddy, spends ages talking it over with him, with Deb, too, and he still has no fucking clue what to do.

Then one day, he decides that he needs a more ruthlessly impartial perspective, to talk to someone with less of a personal stake in his happiness, and there’s only one person for that.

Brian looks much better than he’d expected, given his previous penchant for dealing with loneliness through cheap booze and cheaper sex, Emmett thinks but absolutely does not say out loud. He’d even cried a little - possibly - at their initial meeting at the cottage, had said “Good to see you, Honeycutt,” practically a love declaration, if past experience still holds true. 

The house is strange but appropriate for Brian and Justin, and Emmett can’t help but wonder how much time and love and blood Brian has put into building the perfect life for the two of them, how many years he’s going to spend waiting for Justin.

“I’m in love with Duncan,” he says, and Brian raises his eyebrows. “Good for you,” he says. “Is that a problem?” He knows why Emmett’s here, the prick, but he’s going to make him spell it out.

“I still love George,” Emmett says. “I don’t know what to do- and do _not_ say a threesome, Brian Kinney, I will kick your ass off the cliff out there, I swear to fucking God.”

Brian closes his mouth, looks out at the windows overlooking the ocean with a wry smile. He turns back to Emmett. “Then I guess you have a choice to make.”

“How can I choose?” Emmett says. “I don’t want to hurt either of them. What if George hasn’t moved on from me? What if we could be together again, like we were before? But what if Duncan is my true love instead? Which one of them can I hurt?”

“That’s a lot of what if,” Brian says, and Emmett notices suddenly that he’s not meeting his eyes, and he remembers that Justin has a boyfriend now, and looks around at the house, every detail screaming Justin, and at Brian’s downcast face, and it’s a bad idea but he has to ask.

“Do you ever worry that- that he’ll come here, and decide to stay with him, and not you?”

Brian clenches his jaw for a moment, new tension across his whole body. When he looks up, eyes flashing, he snaps, “What the fuck do you think?”

Emmett tries to backtrack, stammering apologies, but Brian cuts him off. “Of course I fucking worry. I would rip out my own heart for him, but I’m not there for him now, the new guy is, but there’s no use crying over it unless it happens. So until then I don’t dwell on it, because if I do, it’ll destroy me, and when Justin arrives I am going to be greeting him healthy and happy and ready to love him the way he deserves for the rest of eternity. I know what we have, and I know that he wants to be with me, or I hope he does hard enough that I think it’s the truth, and I am going to fight for him like my life depends on it because it absolutely fucking does.”

Brian’s chest is heaving when he finishes, eyes too bright to be dry, and he glares at Emmett, fierce and furious. “Love is selfish no matter what, but the most selfish thing you could do would be to leave Duncan hanging, not knowing if you’re really his or not. Stay with him or leave him, I don’t give a shit, but make a decision and tell him so he can stop torturing himself over whether he can have you or not.”

Emmett nods, unsure if he should speak or not. He whispers “Thank you,” finally, and stands up. 

He’s almost to the door when Brian speaks again.

“But just so you know? A couple of hookups half a century ago is one thing, and a marriage half a life long is another. Don’t let might-have-beens cloud your judgement.”

“Yeah,” Emmett says. “I’ll keep that in mind.” He reaches for the door handle, then turns around. “Are, um, are you okay?”

Brian huffs out a half-laugh. “Believe it or not, I’m pretty sure this is me being well-adjusted.”

Emmett smiles at that, just barely. “Well, if you ever need someone to talk to-”

“I know,” Brian says, now looking out at the ocean again. “And thanks.”

Just before Emmett closes the door, he calls out, “But no fucking blueberry muffins.”

Emmett smiles to himself as he walks down the path, wondering if Aunt Lula has a copy of her favorite old recipe book around somewhere.

***

George is living in a high-rise, a fashionably out-of-style brick building lively even at three in the afternoon. Emmett raises a hand to knock on his door, stops, and then takes a deep breath and raps three times on the white-painted wood.

The door opens, and there he is, looking much the same as Emmett remembers.

“Hi, Georgie,” he whispers, and George just pulls him into a fierce tight hug, arms steadying him as both of them start to cry. 

They have tea and cookies in George’s sitting room - it’s very mid-twenties-Brian-esque, a funny contrast with the old-man snacks, and once Emmett’s exhausted all his jokes on that subject, he sets down his cup and takes George’s hands. 

“I’m so sorry,” he says, quiet. “That we didn’t get the chance to say goodbye.”

“Me too,” George whispers. “I’m so sorry for everything you’ve been through, all the heartbreak. You of all people never deserved that.” 

Emmett closes his eyes, takes in a deep breath, lets it out. He looks at George. “I heard you and Duncan are friends now,” he says, and George smiles, open, sweet. “He’s a lovely man,” he replies. “You’re very lucky.”

“He is,” Emmett says, “and I am.” He looks down at their joined hands, just for a moment. “I was hoping- do you think we could still be friends? I’ve missed you. So much.”

“Of course,” George says, still smiling. “I wouldn’t dream of anything else.”

Years later, shortly after Justin’s arrival, Emmett and Duncan are walking down the beach, hand-in-hand, and they come across Brian and Justin, curved around each other and looking out onto the water. Brian has his eyes closed, an expression of perfect serene bliss on his face, and Justin is smiling softly, his head on Brian’s shoulder. Emmett tugs Duncan to a stop beside them, puts an arm around his waist, and smiles.

“You were right,” he says, to Brian. 

“I’m always right,” Brian says, not opening his eyes, and Justin laughs, and Brian turns to look at him, pulling him into a long deep kiss.

“What was I right about this time?” he says, a minute or so later.

“Half a lifetime isn’t something to scoff at,” Emmett says, and Brian nods, drawing Justin closer to him, kissing his temple, bringing a tiny contented smile to Justin’s face when he does. 

“You got that right,” he says, and Emmett smiles and stands there a moment more before leading Duncan back out across the sand.


	8. Chapter 8

Brian would have finished the last set of proofs earlier, but he can’t keep his mind off of the thing he’s told himself he’s not going to think about, so it’s close to midnight when he’s finally somewhere approaching done. He leaves his office and finds Justin looking out the big living-room window, hands in his pockets, profiled, soft, in golden light from a solitary lamp illuminating the front half of the room.

Brian comes up behind him, wraps him up in his arms, buried his face in Justin’s hair, inhales deep and slow, letting some of the tension drain from his shoulders, and Justin sighs, nearly silently, and leans back against him. Brian rubs his hands on Justin’s arms, closing his eyes, just feeling, soft skin under his fingertips, the warm body against his own, seeing Justin’s face behind shut eyelids, luscious pink lips, upturned nose, clear light eyes, focused on the sea view the way he is when he’s really thinking about something else. _I could eat you alive right now, Sunshine_ , he thinks, and Justin makes a hot little needy noise, as if he can read Brian’s mind.

Brian hums into his hair. “Fuck,” he murmurs, kissing up the side of Justin’s face, circling one hand on his chest, the other sliding teasingly down to the front of his pants. “You are so goddamn gorgeous,” he says, and Justin laughs - his laugh, Christ, Brian could survive on that in place of air and water, he’s sure he could - drawing one arm up around Brian, and they’re reflected like that in the window. Jennifer Grey and Patrick Swayze on the poster for _Dirty Dancing_ , Brian thinks to himself, hiding his smile in the curve of Justin’s neck. 

Justin’s skin is glowing in the lamplight, so pale and soft, stark graphic lines of the tattoos on his arms shifted to almost pure black-and-white. “I’m gonna lick you open nice and slow,” Brian purrs, nipping at his ear, hot breath on the side of Justin’s neck. “Gonna make you come so hard.” Justin moans, presses back even closer against him, body heated all over.

Then he stops.

Brian frowns. “What?”

Justin turns to face him. “We should talk. About tomorrow.”

That would certainly be the responsible thing to do, Brian thinks. Luckily for him, he’s an irresponsible bastard - signed statements to the fact from several of his closest friends available upon request - so now he just nuzzles Justin’s jaw, tells him, “We’ll be talking all day tomorrow. Right now what we need is a good night’s sleep, immediately preceded by a good hard fuck.”

“How did I know that would be your preferred plan of action?” Justin says, with a smile that doesn’t really reach his eyes.

Brian puts one hand on each of his shoulders. “I’m not getting cold feet,” he says, serious, now. “And I will take this seriously, I promise.”

Justin gives him a real smile then, and Brian kisses him before finishing. “I just- I need to be close to you tonight,” he says, and Justin makes the little hungry noise he always makes when Brian says sappy shit like that, and they stumble to the bedroom in a mess of fused mouths and greedy hands, leaving a trail of discarded clothing in their wake.

***

The counseling room is not what Brian expected. He’d been picturing something beige and seafoam green with a cheap carpet, something like what he’d seen on the sole disastrous childhood visit to the Church-affiliated family psychologist, one of his mother’s early ill-fated attempts to get the four of them to at least act like they were happy to be related to each other.

But this room is warm, a little old-fashioned, teakwood paneling along the bottom half of the walls, dusty blue paint on the top half. The furniture has personality, too, cushy jacquard-upholstered armchairs and sofas, no big psychologist desk with the nameplate, a tall ornate lamp off to the side. Not Brian’s taste in the least, but at least there’s no linoleum, and he’s not doing this for himself, anyway.

A short stocky man enters the room. Justin stands up off the sofa and Brian follows, and the man shakes each of their hands, smiling.

“I’m Dr. Stanley,” he says, settling down in the armchair across from them. “It’s very nice to meet both of you.”

“You too,” Justin says, smiling as well, now. Brian just nods.

Dr. Stanley crosses his legs, steeples his fingers over the top knee. “Now, on the first day, we’ll just be talking through this process, getting to know each other a little bit. I’ll outline the steps of the treatment and what you can expect at each stage, and we’ll talk through the feelings you have about what I’ve told you afterward.”

He smiles at both of them again. “Now, Justin, of course, I’ve met you through your work here, I know you’re an artist. Brian, what do you do?”

Brian hadn’t expected there to be a Q&A session, so he has to take a moment before he speaks. “I run a branding firm,” he says. “We focus on interesting independent businesses that want an edge in their outward design.” Once a salesman, always a salesman, even in a postcapitalist world, and he can feel Justin relaxing next to him at the familiar subject. 

Dr. Stanley nods. “And how familiar are you with this particular form of therapy?”

Brian stiffens, so slightly that only Justin notices. “Justin talks about his work here sometimes,” he says. “That’s it.”

“All right,” Dr. Stanley says. “Well, what I’ll tell you about me right now is that I worked as a trauma psychologist for fifty-seven years on earth, and I’ve been doing the same here since a few decades after I died. Here, I specialize in working through traumatic memories that are shared across multiple people, particularly spouses and children, hence my assignment to your case.“

He takes a drink of water from a glass on the table next to his chair. “As far as this treatment itself goes, we will spend several weeks just working through the feelings you have based on your own internal memories of this trauma before we move to watching the visual and audio on a memory screen. We’ll watch in an environment that the two of you deem comfortable, and I will be there to step in if anything starts to get out of hand during those few hours.”

Brian closes his eyes, then opens them again. “Hours? Will we- be watching this more than once?”

The doctor shakes his head. “Oh, no, not on that first day. But it will take a while to view all of the memories surrounding the event - there is the attack itself, and then the weeks in the aftermath, the initial processing-

A muscle in Brian’s jaw is jumping, and Dr. Stanley leans forward. “Is something wrong?”

Brian makes two fists, tries to center himself in the crescents of pain against his palms. “Fine,” he says.

Justin looks at him. “Could we have a moment?”

Dr. Stanley watches the two of them for a moment before answering. “Yes,” he says, after too long a pause, “but I would like to discuss your conversation afterwards, all right? Keeping secrets will be detrimental to the therapy as we move through it.”

Brian makes a nearly imperceptible move towards the door. Justin takes his hand. “Fine,” he says - he’d say anything to get the doctor out of the room, he knows that look in Brian’s eyes and he needs to talk to him, right now - and Dr. Stanley nods and walks to the door, letting it click shut behind him.

Justin turns to Brian, resisting the urge to take his face in his hands. “What’s wrong?”

Brian shifts away from him, across the couch. “Nothing.”

“Bullshit,” Justin says. “Listen, if you’re not ready to do this, I can-”

“Do it alone? No fucking way.”

Justin flushes, going from concerned to pissed off in the blink of an eye. “Did you agree to do this with me because you wanted to _protect_ me? Because you know I’ve gone through much worse alone, I have no problem with-”

“I don’t want you to see me, okay?” Brian says, far too loud in the small room, not meeting his eyes. “The way I was after you- you’ve never seen me like that. Not ever.”

Justin closes his eyes, moves down closer to Brian, taking his hand again. He nuzzles against Brian’s cheek, and Brian leans into the touch, needing to feel Justin warm and alive against him. But Justin pulls away so that he can look Brian right in the eye. 

“I may not have seen what you were going through,” he murmurs, “but you haven’t seen what I did, what I said, while I was awake in the first weeks of recovery.”

“You’d just had your head bashed in,” Brian says, sharp. “You could do and say pretty much anything you fucking liked and have it be justified.”

“And you couldn’t?”

“I wasn’t the one-”

“I don’t care,” Justin says. “As far as I’m concerned, we’ve been in this together from the very start. I wouldn’t have asked you to do this with me if I didn’t know for a fact that you have carried this one thing with you just as long as I have.”

Brian’s looking at him with sad lonely eyes, so Justin hugs him, fierce and tight, and whispers, into his ear, “I will love you no matter what is on that recording. Got it?”

“You don’t-”

“-know that?” Justin says, fire not fading from his voice. “Yeah, I do.”

They just look at each other for a long moment. Then Brian kisses the spot right next to his ear and stands up. “I’ll go get the doctor,” he says, and Justin stands to follow.


	9. Chapter 9

The first day of therapy goes- okay, actually, once they get past the initial crisis. Dr. Stanley mostly asks about them, their relationship, their lives on earth; Justin provides most of the details, Brian reluctant to give answers more than a few words long. Justin isn’t thrilled about that particular part of the experience, but it’s not like he didn’t know what he was getting into, bringing Brian Kinney - simultaneously the worst candidate for counseling in the universe and the person most in need of it - to a talk therapy session.

And there are a few bright spots that day too, ones that take Justin by surprise: Brian, after much prodding by the doctor, looking over at him, saying in that soft vulnerable voice that Justin so rarely gets to hear, “You were so- brave, and innocent, and gorgeous. That’s when I knew I had to have you.” Brian holding his hand throughout the appointment, moving as if to shield him from some invisible threat when the doctor asks a few general questions about the bashing. Brian _being_ there, staying the whole time, not even attempting to project graceful arrogant boredom.

They get home and Brian is quiet, but even more touchy-feely than usual. He molds himself to Justin’s back as he cooks dinner, leans against his side while they eat, kisses him in bed for what feels like hours before fucking him even longer and slower, grinding deep into him, making him shake with pleasure and need, stroking him through one, two, and three orgasms, until Justin is completely and utterly spent, unable to do anything but smile dopily as Brian cleans him up, cradles his body to himself like something precious, stroking Justin’s hair and gazing at him with quiet wonder until he falls asleep.

Day two is harder. The questions focus more on prom, Chris Hobbs, the bashing, and the aftermath. Brian gives one-word answers or silence, clenching his teeth painfully tight, it looks like, when he’s not speaking. Justin doesn’t fill in the gaps he leaves this time, not much, anyway; it’s hard enough for him to give one account of the story, let alone two.

Things really start to get tense on day four. Dr. Stanley begins by explaining that this session will be guided by the notes he’s been taking over the past few days. Brian’s expression goes even more stony than it already was, so Justin has a feeling right from the start that it’s going to be a rough one. He’s right, as he finds out almost immediately. Brian snarls at every perceived assumption on the doctor’s part - Dr. Stanley stays remarkably calm through every barb, but it doesn’t bring Brian down much - and the resulting tension in the atmosphere puts Justin on edge in his own answers, which makes Brian go on the defensive for both of them, which makes Justin irritated and twitchy, and so on, a vicious cycle that drains all the compassion and friendliness from the usually benign appointment room.

They eat mostly without speaking that night, each caught up in their own thoughts, and when Justin goes to bed Brian doesn’t follow, instead going into his office to work late into the night. 

The new cold silence between them grows over the next several appointments. Justin is starving for touch, for Brian to roll him over and pound him into the mattress, the only thing that can take his mind off of what’s coming in the next few weeks. But Brian is reluctant to touch him, suddenly, it seems, sleeping practically on the edge of the bed, avoiding the hundreds of little affectionate touches they’ve been giving each other on a daily basis for most - if not all - of their relationship. He insists everything is fine, that he’s just stressed over work, apologizes for being “withdrawn”. Justin wants to scream.

Justin snaps on day seven. Four days without sex with each other is the longest they’ve gone in years, decades, maybe, and he needs Brian more than he could ever attempt to describe. It doesn’t have to be sex, he’d settle for a nice long hug, would probably come in his pants from a decent kiss, and so when Brian emerges from his office that evening on one of his semi-regular trips to the kitchen for a coffee refill, Justin walks over to him, goes to hold him from behind, rest his face on Brian’s broad warm back.

Brian’s reaction is immediate. He jumps, turns around, shaking Justin off of him, recoiling across the kitchen.

“Okay,” Justin says, stalking towards him, because he is really fucking done with whatever bullshit this is. “What the _fuck_ is up with you?”

Brian looks like he’s been slapped. “Nothing,” he says, voice sharpening, pretending to be annoyed, the way he does when he’s actually scared out of his mind. “Work. I told you.”

Justin laughs, humorless and cold. “Yeah, right. I’ve seen you stressed over work, and this is not that. So what is it?”

When Brian doesn’t say anything, Justin says, “Is it me? Did I say something?”

Brian rolls his eyes. “No.”

“Is it the counseling?”

Brian gives him a look like _what the fuck do you think?_ , which only enrages Justin more.

“You’re such an asshole,” he snaps, not affectionate or playful, the way he usually insults Brian, but biting, vicious. “You don’t touch me for _days_ , you won’t talk to me, and you pretend everything’s fine?”

“Nothing is fine!” Brian snarls, volume rising. “We spend every day having our deepest darkest thoughts picked over by that- _guy_ , who we don’t even _know_ , and then we’re just supposed to come home and act like things are good? Normal?”

Justin shakes his head, fury simmering just below a boil. “So you shut me out? I’m here for you, you know that-”

“Yeah, well, maybe I wish you were a little less _here_ for me. Maybe I don’t want you exposed to the fucked-up shit that’s inside my head, the stuff that the shrink wants to bring up into the light.”

“Fuck you,” Justin says, face flushing. “Fuck. You. You know damn well I can handle whatever horrors your _deepest darkest thoughts_ contain. You know what I think? I think that _you’re_ afraid to deal with them, with those memories you still have. I know I’m afraid of dealing with mine - who wouldn’t be, in this situation? Why don’t you stop putting on that stupid fucking emotionless mask and be honest about it?”

“Drop it,” Brian growls. He tries to leave, return to his office, presumably, but Justin grabs his arm and yanks him back, now fully in the throes of genuine vehement anger. “ _Drop it_? Are you fucking _kidding_ me? You’re acting like I can just ignore that you’re avoiding me, that you look like you’ve just seen a ghost every time I try to touch you.”

“Well, maybe you fucking SHOULD!” Brian shouts, and Justin thinks about storming out, finding someone’s couch to sleep on, leaving Brian to stew alone in their house with his thoughts and his damage and his anger, picking this up again tomorrow.

Instead, he throws Brian against the nearest wall and kisses him with everything he has, one last Hail Mary. For a moment, Brian doesn’t react, stunned, and then there’s a furious needy tongue shoved down Justin’s throat, and Brian is making desperate frenzied animal noises as Justin hitches one leg up around his hips. Justin wants to howl in victory, but he can’t because Brian is trying to swallow him whole, hands going greedily to every place on his body that drives him insane with pleasure, so instead Justin lets himself get crazed with the feeling of being devoured for the first time in days, growls _fuck me now_ into Brian’s demanding mouth, groping shamelessly at his swollen cock. Brian snarls and picks him up, carries him to the sofa, rips off both their clothes and bends Justin over the arm, eats him out until he comes screaming for mercy, then fucks him so hard that Justin can’t even speak afterwards, just quivers underneath Brian, shaky high-pitched gasps slipping unevenly out of him. Brian kisses frantically all over his face, shivering in the aftermath of his own orgasm, whispers _oh, God, Justin, I love you so much, please, I’m so sorry_ , hoarse and quiet, blinking back tears, emanating an intense contrition Justin has never seen in him before, and Justin breathes back _I know, it’s okay, I love you_ when he can form words again, and Brian kisses him softly and reverently, fragile, craving Justin like an addict and his fix. They fuck until dawn, ending up draped over the sofa, Justin still inside him as he passes out from exhaustion. 

When they wake up midday, Justin turns him over, nuzzling against his face, then pulls back to look at him.

“Don’t go there again,” he says, a fiery look in his eyes, but Brian can see something more frightened beneath it. “If we’re going to do this together, we need to be _together_. So you can’t just withdraw from me and pretend like everything’s fine. Understand?”

Brian nods, stroking his face. “I’m-”

“Sorry’s bullshit,” Justin says, but tenderly. “If you’re sorry, then get over yourself and let down the walls a little. You’re with me, remember? I’ll protect you when all the big scary emotions come out to play.”

Brian just looks at him for a long moment. Then he clutches Justin to him fiercely, whispers _I love you, I’ll do my best, I promise_ into his ear, and Justin relaxes into his arms, murmuring soft sweet comforting things back, and Brian feels centered and calm for the first time in days. 

They watch the memories on day fifteen. Dr. Stanley tells them a few days beforehand, talks it through with them, what they might feel, different ways they can manage those emotions. On the day of, Justin and Brian arrive early, before Dr. Stanley. They sit next to each other on the couch, holding hands, bodies practically overlapping, their standard position at appointments nowadays. 

Justin looks at Brian, kisses him gently. “Are you feeling okay?” he says.

“No,” Brian says. “But I’m ready. You?”

Justin nods. “The same.”

Brian pulls him close, kisses along his cheekbones, his nose, and Justin smiles.

They settle back down when Dr. Stanley comes into the room.

“Afternoon, gentlemen,” he says, not smiling. “How are we feeling?”

Brian looks at Justin, then at Dr. Stanley. “I can go first today,” he says, and the doctor nods, and they begin.


	10. Chapter 10

It only takes fifteen minutes, maybe a little more, for the doctor to deem them officially ready. Brian’s twitching in his seat as Dr. Stanley opens a memory window in the wall of the counseling office, so Justin squeezes his hand, and Brian gives him a thin tight smile.

The images start then, and it’s them at prom, Justin glowing, incandescently beautiful, laughing as they dance, Brian sleek and elegant next to him, picking him up and twirling him, kissing him, and even though they both know what’s coming, Justin still smiles at him, presses even closer to him on the couch.

Then they’re walking to the car, still kissing, still laughing, and Brian has to fight back the urge to scream at their past selves, to tell himself to take Justin home, to run, anything. 

He forces himself to keep his eyes open through all of it, his own desperate attempt to save Justin, the awful sound of the bat connecting with Justin’s head and the discovery that his nightmares were entirely accurate in recreating it. His past self sprints forward, attacks Hobbs, not giving him a second glance as he screams and collapses, and then he’s kneeling over Justin, trying to tell if he’s even alive, and the Justin next to him gasps and clutches at him at past-Brian’s anguished howl, and that’s when Brian remembers that this is all new to Justin, because of course he wasn’t awake to witness this part of the story. 

Justin curls around him tighter and tighter as they keep watching, Brian being pulled from his lifeless body by the paramedics, Michael running to comfort him as he sits catatonic in the hospital hallway. Justin is crying now, Brian can tell from the way his shoulders are shaking, and he pulls him in even closer, and Justin clutches at him even tighter, and they cling to each other like that as the stream of memories continues.

Brian shouldn’t be surprised, really, but it’s even more horrible than he’d imagined to watch the aftermath of the bashing, him and Justin falling apart in opposite directions. He watches himself living in a waking hell, unable to sleep unless he was too drunk and high to stand up, fucking every guy he could find in a fruitless attempt to hold off the nightmares, standing sentry over Justin every night, sometimes drunk, sometimes not, always wearing the bloody scarf under his clothing, a reminder of what he was doing penance for. He sees the first few weeks of Justin’s waking hours for the first time, Justin struggling to understand what had happened, and disbelief giving way to anger, throwing things, screaming at his mother, his friends, asking for Brian when he was more lucid, fighting day after day to get stronger, strong enough to leave, strong enough to go find Brian on his own. Brian doesn’t think it’s possible to hold Justin tighter than he already is, but he tries anyway.

When the screen goes black, they’re a single body on the couch. Brian buries his wet face on Justin’s neck, and Justin presses a tiny soft kiss to his temple that very nearly shatters him open.

The doctor doesn’t try to talk to them, just lets them hold each other and cry, and if Brian wasn’t completely focused on breathing in Justin, only Justin, he might wonder how anyone could do this as a job, witness this kind of raw grief on a regular basis.

But as it is, he just focuses on clinging onto Justin, close as he can, grounding himself against his body, in their present life, the way they’ve been practicing, and finally he understands why they had to wait so goddamned long to actually do this viewing, because if he didn’t have the few tools Dr. Stanley has carefully prepared for them right now, he thinks he might actually have lost his mind.

He surprises everyone, including himself, when he turns his head to speak.

“There was so much blood.”

Justin makes a little choked sobbing noise, but he’s still stroking Brian’s back, and Brian needs to talk, suddenly, to purge this poison from himself, so he doesn’t stop.

“You would have thought I would have remembered that,” he says, “the number of times I relived that moment, in nightmares, when I was asleep, when I was awake. But I don’t think I did, until now.” He looks at Justin, who has his face against Brian’s shoulder now, breathing shuddery breaths in and out. “There was so _much_ , all over you, and then it was all over me too, and you weren’t moving, you looked _dead_ , I thought you were dead, I-”

Brian hasn’t cried for real in front of anyone other than his very closest family in- ever, actually, but now he breaks down now, sobbing, and Justin gasps again and clutches at him, and Brian doesn’t even try to stop the flow of tears. It feels kind of good, in a strange terrible way. It feels like he’s cleansing his soul.

And then the other thing he needs to say comes back into his mind, and iron bands constrict his chest, dread and self-hatred and anger choking him.

“I was a coward,” he whispers, unable to speak any louder. “You needed me, and I wasn’t there, and-” 

Justin’s grabbing him, now, steadying him. “It’s okay,” he’s murmuring, “I forgive you,” seeping into him like ointment into a burn, and Brian begins to breathe again.

It takes them more than two hours to talk through everything they’re feeling, Dr. Stanley now more of a guide than an interviewer, gently keeping them on track for the rest of the appointment. 

They leave with an assurance that they’ll be back tomorrow - some people believe they’re done at this point, he tells them, but quitting now could do even more harm - and walk home, arms around each other.

“It feels different, doesn’t it?” Justin says, nudging against Brian’s chin. 

Brian doesn’t ask what, just nods, choking on emotion again, and Justin stops and kisses him until he calms.

They spend hours in bed that night holding each other, kissing, making love - it’s a mushy sentimental day already, Brian decides, and in for a penny and all that shit - and talking in between, cuddled up close together.

“I’m so proud of you,” Justin whispers to him, as they’re lying on their sides facing each other. “Of us.” Normally, Brian would try to break the weepy atmosphere with a joke, maybe a playful insult, but he doesn’t want to, now, so he just kisses Justin deep and soft, inhaling every little sigh it pulls from him. “We’re through the worst of it now,” Brian says, really just trying for reassuring, but the moment he says it out loud he knows it’s true, and Justin smiles, kisses his cheek, bumps their noses together. “Just watch us,” he murmurs, his eyes never leaving Brian’s. “Piece of cake, from here on out.”

Their appointment the next day isn’t easy, but it’s almost laughably lighter than the previous one. Brian spends most of it gazing peacefully at Justin, even when he’s talking, which merits him a few good-natured elbow-jabs, but he knows that in reality Justin is feeling the same as he is, dizzy from losing an immense weight he hadn’t even known he’d been carrying.

They go out to Inferno for the first time in forever in the evening, dancing - making out on the dance floor, really, but close enough - and laughing, high on a new kind of freedom that Brian hadn’t known existed.

“I wish we could stay here,” Justin says, nipping at his jaw.

Brian frowns, stroking his hair. “I don’t think they close until five.”

Justin laughs and kisses him on the nose. “I mean, I wish we could just- live here, for a few weeks. Get away from everything, just live in the moment.”

Brian grins at him then, pulls him into a real kiss, the kind that leaves him gasping for air. “Remember how I keep forgetting to tell you important things? I think you’re really going to like this one.”

***

The train glides like a droplet of liquid silver through a mountain range, a desert, a broad swath of deep forest. Justin inhales each new landscape as it comes, drawing them with rapid frantic strokes of his pencil, and Brian watches him watching the world. They pass two cities, one tiny and cheerful, stacks of short buildings framing wide flat roads, the other larger - smaller than their home city, though - and bustling, sidewalks crowded with pedestrians.

Then the train curves around the side of a rock face, and in front of them is a glittering tangle of buildings, almost visibly pulsing, even from a distance. Justin tears his eyes away from it to look at Brian. “Tell me this is it.”

Brian grins. “But that’d spoil all the fun,” he says, eyes sparkling, and Justin rolls his eyes, smiling, turns back to the window, already building the thin spires on the horizon into his sketchbook, pale grey lines pulling a city from nothing.

The track is elevated as they enter the city limits, and there’s glitter falling across the windows, thick heavy bass pumping through the carriage’s steel walls. People are dancing in the streets below them, on balconies and roofs beside them, even in the commuter transports slipping by their own long-distance train. Brian tries not to laugh at the way Justin has his nose pressed to the window, head twitching from side to side as he tries to take everything in at once.

They pull to a stop, and Justin turns again to face him. “Surprise,” Brian says, immersing himself in Justin’s big wondrous eyes, a look he almost hasn’t seen since- well, since before the bashing. Not really, not like this. “They call it Elyrium, but it’s actually just the best party not on earth.”

Justin throws his arms around him, kisses his cheek, vibrating with excitement. “This is- amazing,” he says, still stealing glances out the window every five seconds. Brian smiles at him and kisses him back, thanking several gods he doesn’t believe in for Dr. Stanley’s willingness to let them switch to weekly remote check-ins. 

The doors hiss open, and they grab their bags and walk to the exit, hand-in-hand. “I can’t wait to see the place,” Justin says. “Is it big? A house? Or more in the middle of things?”

Brian has a funny expression on his face, so Justin stops, turns to get a better look at him. “What’s up?”

“Okay,” Brian says, tongue tucked in his cheek. He looks at Justin, looks away, looks back. “So I’ve been ... here ... before. Twice. But, um. I, uh, haven’t actually ever gone to our home here.”

Justin frowns. “Why not?”

Brian shrugs, still not looking quite at him. Justin actually thinks he might be blushing. He tilts his head, gives Brian a good hard stare, and Brian laughs, a little, and says, “When I found out about- this, that everyone has a second place to live, somewhere, a place they can escape to, and that we could ours was here- I wanted to leave something for us to discover, uh, together. So I got a hotel room, before. It just felt- right, to wait for you until staying in our own place here.”

Justin’s looking at him with that bottomless gaze that always makes him feel as if he’s being cored out, his most tightly kept fears and weaknesses in plain view. Then Justin takes his head in his hands and kisses him, hard, right in the middle of the busy station, biting teasingly at his mouth, soft greedy noises sliding easily out of him. When he pulls back, Brian is almost out of breath, and there’s nothing to do but follow in helpless bliss as Justin takes his hand again and pulls him toward the platform exit.

If the music was loud inside the train, it’s all-consuming now, deep basslines mixing like traffic intersections above and below and all around them. They take a skywalk to the other side of the station, where the commuter trains are loading up, and catch one right as the doors are about to close, running to jump into the car just in time, still holding hands, laughing madly.

“How come you’ve only been here twice?” Justin says, staring around at all the people inside and outside the car. “I would have thought this would be your dream full-time life.” Brian takes a second before he answers.

“It-” he says, and stops. “It’s not the same, taking these trips alone, as it used to be for me. Things get a little numb ... soulless, sometimes. This life.” He kisses the side of Justin’s face, breathes him in, clean and warm-smelling, stark contrast to the familiar damp smell of debauchery that pervades every part of Elyrium. “I’m glad we live where we do, although I certainly wouldn’t say no to a few yearly trips here. Or more.”

Justin grins and bumps up against him. “I think I could be convinced.”

They arrive outside the building where their “unit” is. It’s a gleaming skyscraper, silvery-white, right in the middle of the downtown, and when they get off the train they’re swept up in a throbbing current of people. Brian keeps a tight hold on Justin’s hand, despite himself, and they eventually manage to make their way across the street.

The lobby of the building is huge, shiny and sparkling and nearly as busy as the street outside, people leaning on walls, on chairs, each other, talking and laughing. The central space is open right to the top of the building, where a skylight casts bright sun against mirrors on each of the many tiers ringing the walls, each with walkways dotted evenly with numbered doors. The two of them weave through the labyrinth of bodies - Justin watches with amusement as Brian cruises four different guys just on their way across the lobby - until they reach the entry of a glass elevator, one of several crystal cylinders that rocket up and down the rows and rows of apartments.

They crowd onto the car with a group of laughing twentysomethings, arms around each other, and they look down at the shrinking figures on the first floor as the elevator shoots up its shaft.

The car stops close to the top tier, and Brian says, “This is it,” tugging Justin out of the doors before they close again. They walk until they reach apartment 8111, and then Brian touches a black glass square where a lock should be and the door clicks open.

Justin’s first reaction when he sees the room is to stare. Then, a second later, he bursts out laughing.

“What?” Brian says, still giving the room’s furnishings an appreciative once-over - vast black marble floor with an Alaska king bed against the back wall, huge chiffon-curtained windows overlooking the network of streets and train tracks and balconies below them, sunken hewn-stone pool off to the side, a five-headed glass shower stall big enough for a fair-sized orgy in one corner - and Justin says, still grinning, “Our vacation home is a sex dungeon, Brian.”

Brian frowns. “Yeah...”

Justin is overtaken by another fit of giggles. “Look,” he wheezes, walking across the shining floor towards the enormous bed. “There are already loops built into the headboard!”

“I did bring handcuffs,” Brian says, with a leer.

“So did I,” Justin says. “Not really my point.”

Brian comes up behind him, starts unbuttoning his shirt. “So what is?”

Justin turns to kiss him. “I guess that our tastes are very predictable.”

Brian growls, picks him up, practically throws him down on the bed. “Predictable?” he says, looming over Justin, pinning his hands to the bed.

Justin grins, totally unruffled. “Extremely.”

Brian bites him, drawing a hot little yelp. “You think I’m predictable?”

“We are. As people. Deeply and disturbingly so. But I think,” Justin says, stroking shamelessly down the skin exposed by the open neck of Brian’s shirt, “that you should quit fixating on that and fuck me.”

He smiles up, faux-innocent, and when has Brian ever been able to resist a look like that?


	11. Chapter 11

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> I live in the US and today is, uh, nervewracking, so have some feel-good story I wrote to distract myself this evening.

Brian flops onto his back while Justin’s still gasping, legs shaking, his whole body aching in satisfaction.

Justin whimpers, reaching for him, a mess of limp fucked-out limbs and wanton need. It’s only been a few hours since they arrived, but he’d tossed out any remaining shreds of dignity almost immediately, a decision that he, truth be told, feels pretty damn good about.

“You know,” Brian says, panting, sweat beaded across his beautiful torso, “usually, when people go on vacation, they don’t just stay in one room.”

Justin grins up at the mirrored ceiling, stretching luxuriously, mentally calculating how long it’ll be until Brian can fuck him again. “Are you complaining?”

“Wouldn’t dream of it,” Brian breathes, rolling onto his side and running his hands all over Justin’s body. Justin hums and arches into the touch, moaning in indecently hot gratification.

“We _should_ probably go check out the parties at some point, I guess,” Justin says, absently, because Brian is licking across his chest, moving lower, dropping small warm kisses over his ribcage as he does. “Could be fun to fuck somewhere else.”

Brian looks up at him and grins. “You don’t have to convince me, Sunshine.”

Justin smiles back, pushing his hands into Brian’s hair. Brian swallows down his mostly-soft cock, making these beautiful hungry little growling sounds while he does it, and Justin arches up, delirious with warm drugging happiness and lust, into the tangle of sheets and pillows on the bed.

***

“Okay,” Justin pants, “okay, I think I might be done for now.”

Brian grins down at him, drags two fingers through the mess of come and lube on his stomach and pushes them into his ass, crooking them just right to pull a quivery oversensitive whimper from Justin, his head tossing back and forth on the pillow. “Yeah?” Brian says. “You’re done?” 

Justin nods, fast, eyes squeezed shut, and Brian gives his prostate one more hard tap and pulls his fingers out. Justin moans, wet pink mouth dropping open, and Brian definitely can’t get it up again right now but fuck, is it a close thing. He drops onto Justin, strokes his arms, kisses him greedily, and Justin smiles a wide satisfied smile up at him when he pulls away.

They wash off in the palatial glass shower, then leave the room in search of food (there’s a kitchen - they think, there’s a small possibility it’s actually some kind of bondage station - but the space-agey fridge has nothing in it). There’s an attractively dingy cantina with great mojitos down the street from their building, they discover, and they sit on squeaky barstools and share a huge plate of arroz con pollo and watch the flood of decked-out partiers moving in and out.

Justin points at a shirtless man wearing a long green boa. “Do you remember that one time in Puerto Rico, we hooked up with-”

“-that diving instructor,” Brian says, grinning. “Think that’s him?”

“You have to admit there’s a resemblance,” Justin says, fork-fighting him for the last piece of chicken. As usual, Brian lets him win. 

***

As they’re taking the elevator back up to the room, Justin says, “Feels just like the old days, doesn’t it?”

Brian frowns at him. “Like what?”

Justin grins. “You picking me up at a bar, whisking me back to your lair for amazing sex.” Brian grins back, grabs at his crotch, pushes him up the glass wall of the elevator for a deep messy kiss.

They walk hand-in-hand to the room. When they get inside, Justin rummages through Brian’s suitcases until he finds what he wants. He holds up the sleeveless black button-down with the snaps, and Brian takes it, rolling his eyes. Then he stops.

Justin looks at him. “What’s up?”

Brian laughs, soft. “I just had a very weird idea. Can you, uh, look away?”

“You know I’ve probably seen you naked more times than I’ve seen you in clothes, right?”

“Justin.”

“Okay, okay, I’m looking away...”

Justin hears the sounds of clothes rustling behind him, considers the range of snarky comments available to him, doesn’t make any of them.

“You can- look now,” Brian says, strangely hesitant.

Justin turns, eyebrows raised, and then he stops and stares.

“So...” Brian says.

“Oh, wow,” Justin breathes, still taking him in, Brian at twenty-nine, exactly as he looked on the day they’d met, and it’s not that much younger than the body he normally lives in here but that somehow makes it all the more shocking, the difference there is. This Brian is all dangerous beauty, sex on legs, half emotional immaturity and half the swagger that Justin now recognizes as his armor against the world, and he might be imagining it but he’d swear that right now he can see that pain Brian was constantly running from at this age right below the surface in a way it hasn’t been for fifty years or more.

“Jesus,” Justin murmurs, sliding both his hands into Brian’s hair, and Brian smiles and moves toward the touch, and just like that, the man he loves now is back, gazing, gently adoring, at him.

Justin kisses him, the kind of kiss his seventeen-year-old self would have never dared attempt, rough and wet and hard, tilting Brian’s head with his hands to get in deeper. When they separate, foreheads touching, Brian laughs, wearing a soft genuine smile that Justin rarely saw when his face looked like this.

“This is- very weird,” Justin murmurs, reaching up to stroke his cheek. “And cool.” Brian grins at him, rakish, now, seductive and gorgeous. “I thought that as long as we were taking a trip down memory lane, I might as well go all in.”

“So,” Brian continues, nuzzling down Justin’s face, breathing in behind his ear. “You want to go out with me tonight?”

Justin grins, rubbing up against him, arms looped around his neck. “My seventeen-year-old self just came in his pants, just so you know.”

Brian laughs again. “And you- now?”

“Getting there,” Justin murmurs, kissing along his neck. “Getting there.”


	12. Chapter 12

Justin gets back midday, dropping the groceries next to the door as he comes into the apartment. Brian’s in bed, two men with him - _servicing_ him, Justin thinks with a nasty little inward smile - regal, gorgeous, head tossed back, one hand on each of the tricks’ heads as they suck him off.

Justin has things to do, really, the groceries to put away, and there’s a charcoal sketch he wants to finish, but what’s the point of being dead and on vacation if you don’t take advantage of the finer things once in a while?

“Room for one more?” he says, smirking, and Brian opens his eyes, a broad lazy sexy grin spreading over his face. “Do you ever have to ask?” he murmurs. Justin strips slowly, enjoying the hungry way Brian’s eyes rake down his body, then climbs onto the bed. He puts a hand on Brian’s chest and kisses him, hard, hot and possessive, pushing him back into the pillows, drawing a soft groan from his open mouth. _Mine_ , Justin thinks satisfactorily, licking over Brian’s jaw to taste.

Brian takes charge then, turns to his purest form, raw addictive sex in every angle, the way he moves. “Boys, meet Justin,” he says, to the tricks, still dutifully blowing him. The two heads bob up, take in Brian and Justin together, royalesque against the headboard, divine beings glowing in the afternoon daylight. One of them makes a hungry noise, goes for Justin’s cock, and Justin smiles, lets Brian tug him into a delicious slow-burning kiss, relaxing into the languid indulgent pleasure of the moment as their bodies tangle luxuriously on the bed.

“Seems like you’ve been having a productive afternoon,” Justin says, smirking, when Brian comes up for air. The trick sucking him has a very nimble tongue, not much of a gag reflex either, so he weaves a hand into the guy’s hair and pushes, just a little, drawing a low hot groan from him.

“You have no idea,” Brian purrs, biting up and down his neck and soothing the new marks with kisses. “I fucked these two guys at once in that club on Fourth while you were out before I ran into our friends here. Hot, slutty, shot like fountains. They were both walking bowlegged when they left.”

Justin moans through a ravenous grin, pupils dilated. “Securing your reputation in our home away from home?”

Brian grins back before pulling him into a messy tongue-kiss. “Had to do _something_ until you got back.”

“Mmmm,” Justin says, really starting to lose track of the conversation now as the head in his lap bobs faster, and Brian laughs at his strained expression, claiming him with a filthy rough kiss against the headboard.

***

“That was fun,” Justin says, as Brian’s closing the apartment door behind the departing tricks. Brian turns to look at him, grinning, but then he has to stop and stare, because Justin is stretched out luminous and debauched on the bed, and it’s not like Brian’s never seen him like that before, but there’s something about the way the light from the windows is pooling in the curves of Justin’s body that takes all of Brian’s breath away.

Brian licks his lips, still staring, and Justin starts to sit up, and that’s when Brian realizes what he needs to do.

“Can you just- stay like that, for a moment?” he says, and Justin gives him a weird look but he doesn’t move. Brian goes over to the closet, digs through his stuff until he finds the compact camera he always brings on vacation in case some flash of campaign inspiration strikes him.

He turns around, holding it. “I- um-” he says, hating how unplanned this is, how he hasn’t had time to make up a more elegant proposal. “Can I take your picture?” he says, finally.

Justin frowns, gestures at himself. “Uh, like this?”

“It’s-” Brian says, looking down at the camera and back up. “I think it’s like when you draw me.”

Justin smiles at him then, that life-changing sunny open smile, and Brian’s stomach unclenches a little. “You want to take photos of me the way I want to draw you?”

Brian strokes two fingers over the camera, still nervous. “Yeah? I don’t know why- it just hit me.”

“It feels like that sometimes,” Justin says, still smiling. He settles back into the bed. “By all means, do your worst. Or best, hopefully.”

Brian gives him a small near-shy smile back, coming back into the bed. He raises the camera, turns it on, and yes, this is what he needs, capturing Justin exactly as he sees him, sweetness and terrifying power all in one, the moments of light across his body committed to pixels on an SD card. 

He takes photo after photo, some of Justin smiling, talking, laughing, some of him just laying there, gazing at Brian or nothing in particular when Brian gets too distracted to talk. 

It takes maybe thirty minutes, but it feels like he’s pouring all of himself into every new image in a way he’s only rarely experienced taking test shots for a campaign. When he’s done, for the moment, anyway, he realizes he’s hard enough to pound nails, and Justin is staring at him with gorgeous awed hunger.

He takes one last shot, needing to capture the voracious expression on Justin’s face, and then he sets the camera down and stalks to the bed.

“Christ,” Justin breathes, as Brian pushes him slowly up against the headboard. “If that’s what I look like when I paint, I think I understand why you always jump me after watching me.”

Brian licks a long satisfying stripe up the side of his neck, ending in a hot wet needy kiss on the mouth. “If this is how you feel when you paint, I think I understand why _you_ jump _me_ every time you finish one of those inspiration frenzy things you do.”

“Yeah,” Justin says, not really feeling the urge to elaborate. Brian keeps licking him, sliding slowly down his chest, his stomach, until he’s kneeling between Justin’s spread legs. He looks up with an expression that Justin would swear is frightened, and Justin knows this feeling too, the fear of how intense it is, the realization that a piece of his heart is now inside a small brick of metal on a chair halfway across the room.

“It’s okay,” Justin murmurs, stroking his arms. “You can let go, Brian, let me feel it too. I can take it, you know that.

Brian just looks at him for a second, a sweet, adoring look that Justin knows absolutely that no one else can have, and then he hitches Justin’s thighs up on his shoulders and buries his face in his ass. Brian’s desperate, suddenly, to get deep into the core of him, to touch some of that warm glowing beauty for himself, so he licks hard, tongue sliding deeper and deeper as Justin opens up. Justin’s screaming below him, he thinks, begging and praying, but he’s really having a very hard time focusing on anything other than the rich musky skin he’s devouring.

It’s still not enough, so he spreads him wider, nibbles all around the soft folds of skin right at the edge of Justin’s asshole. Justin is sobbing now, soft pale skin flushing pink all over his body, legs shaking on Brian’s shoulders as he pleads. 

“Ohgod-” he moans, high-pitched, nearly hysterical, “please, Brian, please-”

Brian isn’t sure what he’s asking for. He’s not sure Justin does either, actually - he’d ask, but that’d require that he stop tongue-fucking him, which is not an option he’s willing to consider.

Justin’s trying desperately to grind back against his face, but the angle is all wrong for it. He begs for Brian’s fingers, his cock, and Brian just snarls and licks him harder.

Justin comes, toes curling, hair darkened with sweat, and the sweetly delirious gasps and whines coming out of him are almost enough to make Brian follow, but he forces it back, wanting more.

Brian opens him up roughly, while he’s still quivering, tiny helpless whimpers slipping out of him every few seconds. Justin stares up at him with dazed beautiful eyes as he pushes in, groaning, and then they’re there, rocking together, no finesse or fine-honed skill here, just dirty wonderful sex, panting all over each other.

Justin comes a second time, and it looks like it hurts, wrung-out little wails punched out of him every few seconds, and this time Brian does follow him over, gasping, watching the twinges of hard overdone pleasure fade to a loose floating bliss in Justin’s blotchy beautiful face.

When he pulls out, Justin doesn’t look especially conscious, so Brian just cradles his warm limp body against his chest and nuzzles at his cheek. Justin groans, faint, and his eyes flutter open.

“Hi,” Brian murmurs, brushing their lips together.

Justin laughs weakly. “Hi.”

“You okay?” Brian says, one hand tangling into Justin’s hair.

Justin nods, eyes closed, smiling blissfully. “So okay.”Brian smiles back, bumps his nose, and Justin tilts his head to kiss him softly.

“I want to see the pictures you took,” he murmurs, nestling even closer against Brian. “Also, we should really put away the groceries.”

Brian laughs. “Later.”

“Later,” Justin says, nodding soft and heavy against him, drifting off in the warmth of Brian’s body. “Yeah.”


	13. Chapter 13

Justin wakes up lying across the foot of the bed, his face against Brian’s stomach. He sits up, too fast, and immediately flops back down, palms on his throbbing temples.

There’s a feeble snicker above him. “And you used to say margaritas were your drink,” Brian says, one hand against his own head. Justin flips him off.

He makes another attempt at verticality, slower this time, and looks around. 

He pokes Brian. “Uh-”

Brian sits up too, groaning, and freezes when he sees their guests still there, sleeping in a post-fuck pile on the floor.

“Shit.”

“Yeah,” Justin says.

“Why didn’t we kick them out last night?”

“Probably because of the copious amounts of drugs and liquor we’d consumed.”

“Probably,” Brian says. “Fuck.”

Justin pats him on the shoulder. “I’m going to go make coffee. Good luck with- this.”

“Fuck you.”

Justin kisses him on the cheek. “Same to you, darling.”

Brian dispatches the remnants of the previous evening’s orgy with the tact and grace he’s famous for - that is, none at all - but he does let them shower first, so overall it goes okay. 

Once they have the apartment to themselves again, Justin makes pancakes, Brian lazing warm and solid against him as he cooks, and they eat in comfortable silence on the balcony, watching the daily morning hose-down of the streets below them.

“What do you want to do today?” Justin says, later, as they’re getting dressed.

Brian shrugs on a shirt. “The usual?”

Justin smiles. “Why not?” he says, coming over to kiss him. “It’s what we’re here for.”

***

They have lunch at the restaurant in their building’s cavern of a lobby, sitting on tiny tall chairs amongst the flow of visitors and residents. In the afternoon, Justin retrieves his sketchbook from the apartment and leaves Brian to pursue a slinky brunette top (he’s almost run out of jokes about how Brian likes to fuck less-hot versions of himself, which feels deeply tragic). He takes a commuter train out to the mesa cluster on the outskirts of Elyrium, drawing the desert landscape and the spiked city soaring out of it.

An hour or so after he arrives, he hears familiar footsteps behind him. “Thought I might find you here,” Brian says, coming to sit next to him on the ridge. Justin lets himself be pulled into a long soft kiss, smiling when they untangle themselves.

Brian looks over at his sketchbook, flips gently through the day’s work. “These are amazing, you know that?”

“Yes,” Justin says, smirking, and Brian laughs. 

Justin points at the top page of the sketchbook. “I think I’m going to do a series on this, something about protrusions on the horizon. I was thinking charcoal on gessoed Bristol, but maybe something unusual over top, holographic glitter or mirror paint - I haven’t decided yet.”

“Whatever you do, I’m sure it’ll be stunning, as always,” Brian says, probably intending to be a little sarcastic but not sounding insincere in the least.

“I have plenty of time to figure it out, anyway, because I don’t want to start until I’m done with the portrait series from the counseling center,” Justin says. 

“Oh,” Brian says. “Right.”

***

They go club-hopping in the evening, dancing until the sun starts to rise again, casting its strange burnt glow interlaced with the sloping shadows of the buildings. They walk home hand-in-hand, talking and laughing, traveling with the current of people in the streets.

When they get back to the apartment, there’s something that Justin doesn’t like in Brian’s face, an inwardness to how he’s holding himself.

“You okay?” he murmurs, coming up behind him, reaching around to start unbuttoning his shirt.

Brian turns around, smiling, softly. “Fine. I- I was just thinking about how we haven’t talked about when we’re going to leave.”

Justin nods. “Do you want to talk about it?"

Brian shrugs. "I want you to be able to- do all those portraits you're planning, to paint in your studio. All that stuff we need to be at home for."

Justin smiles and turns Brian around to face him, dropping small warm kisses on his cheekbones. "I love that you care that I can work if I want to," he says. "But this, what we're doing here- it's healing, right? Getting something back that we lost?"

Brian closes his eyes, nods forward until their heads touch. "Yeah. It is."

"Okay, then," Justin murmurs, slipping both arns around Brian's neck. "I need to be as healed as I can be to do the portrait project, you know? To find the right subjects, to figure out how my own exp- my own trauma fits into it. I need to take it, the risk of it, seriously. The- our own counseling showed me that."

"Okay," Brian says back. After a kiss and a pause, he adds, "How come you're so much better at putting these things into words?"

Justin just laughs, which isn't really an answer, but Brian doesn't mind.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> fun fact, there are cities on our own mortal plane that actually do hose down their party districts every morning. I stayed in New Orleans the week after Mardi Gras one year, and even the streetlamps in the French Quarter looked hungover.


	14. Chapter 14

Justin finds Brian lying flat on the floor when he returns from his latest sketching location, the top of a skyscraper with an amazing view of a group of rock spires miles outside of Elyrium.

Justin frowns down at him. “Everything okay?”

Brian gives him a tired, drunk-sounding laugh. “Everything’s great.”

Walking over so that he can stare straight down at him, Justin says, “Are you sure?”

Brian rolls his eyes. “I’m fine, Sunshine.”

Justin raises an eyebrow in an alarmingly good impression of him.

Brian groans. “I wore myself out, okay? There were all of these _guys_ , at that bar on Mediano, and they were so _pretty_ , and they were all desperate for me to fuck them. I just couldn’t stop myself.” 

Justin’s very obviously trying not to laugh as he lowers himself to the floor. He pets Brian’s hair. “Poor baby.”

Brian glares at him. “It’s- pathetic, is what it is. I mean, they were hot and all, but nothing new for me...”

This time, Justin does laugh. “Sounds like the problem was quantity, not quality.”

“I couldn’t even fuck the last one. I played it off, obviously, but I couldn’t do it, there were just too many.”

“Fuck, that’s hot,” Justin sighs, pink starting to flush over his cheekbones.

“Not helping,” Brian says, pointedly, through gritted teeth. Justin laughs and keeps stroking his hair, which feels irritatingly soothing.

“This could become a national holiday,” Justin says, faintly grinning. “Commemorating the day Brian Kinney finally had enough sex.”

“I don’t even _want_ sex right now, that’s the most depressing thing,” Brian says, because he’s committed to throwing this pity party now and he might as well go all in. If he acts helpless enough, Justin will probably insist on coddling him for the rest of the day, and he can pretend to hate it to save face even though they both know better.

Justin snickers. “You should take up gardening,” he says. “I’ll get you one of those big floppy hats, we can name the cats back home and let them live in the house-”

“Fuck _off_ ,” Brian groans. _So much for the coddling._

But Justin is unperturbed. “I know what you need,” he says, suddenly all disgustingly bright-eyed and energetic.

“Codeine and Viagra,” Brian says. 

Justin doesn’t even acknowledge that, just presses the wall switch that retracts the cover from the heated pool in the floor of the apartment.

“Come on, strip,” he says, pulling his shirt over his head. “You’ll kill your back like that, and you need to relax.”

Brian stares at him longingly, everything he could ever ask for in a nice fuckable bottom, big cock, ass to die for, more than a little attitude, and curses the unfairness of being too tired to want to take him right this second.

Justin’s smirking at him, reading his mind, as usual. He helps Brian out of his clothes and into the pool, then sits down against him. “Don’t look so depressed,” he murmurs, smiling into Brian’s neck. “Benefits of a real relationship, remember? I’ll still be here for you to ravage when you’re ... up ... to it again.”

He chuckles. “Then maybe you can try to get to this point again just from fucking me.”

Brian pinches the bridge of his nose, dick making a fruitless and painful attempt to stand to attention. “Justin. Please.”

He’s still smirking, the little prick. “Sorry, sorry, no sexy stuff, I forgot.” _Bullshit_ , Brian thinks, but the way Justin’s rubbing his shoulders really does feel nice, so he doesn’t say it out loud.

Justin starts pressing tiny soft kisses down the side of his face, not like foreplay, really, more just as a quiet warm reminder of his presence at Brian’s side. _Killing me with kindness_ , Brian thinks, flashing back for just a second to a moment in time when his problems were much more real and urgent. 

“I guess it really is highly effective,” he murmurs.

“Huh?” Justin says. 

Brian turns to smile at him. “Nothing.”


	15. Chapter 15

It hits Justin while he and Brian are in bed in the early hours of the morning. They’d danced for hours the previous night, drunk on each other, and they’ve been fucking since they got back to the apartment, writhing languidly around the huge mattress, mouths fused together.

Justin is high as a kite and Brian is higher; his eyes are huge and round and he keeps getting distracted by different parts of Justin’s body, his shoulders, the side of his neck, a few strands of his hair falling across his forehead. They’re on their sides, facing each other, Justin’s right leg flung up over Brian’s left hip, Brian grinding into him with deep heavy strokes that melt his spine.

“Fuck,” Brian murmurs, sweaty hair sticking to his forehead, still staring at Justin with that wide-open gaze. “Fuck, you feel so good.” He nuzzles in closer and rubs their faces together. “I love you,” he whispers, soft and breakable. “I love you, I love you, oh, Christ, Justin-”

He looks almost wild now, frightened, maybe, so Justin shushes him gently, licks into Brian’s mouth as the words stumble to a stop. “I know,” Justin whispers back, in between kisses. “And I love you.”

Brian smiles at him, still vulnerable but more steady, now. “You love me.” 

Justin smiles back and hums, claims his mouth again, and then they’re back to wordless noise, wrapping around each other again and again in their small warm safe piece of heaven.

They cling together afterwards, still kissing, laughing, smiling. That’s when Justin realizes, and because they’re not in the habit of keeping secrets and also because he hasn’t taken ecstasy for a while and his inhibitions are lowered, to put it lightly, he immediately says it out loud.

“I think I’m ready to go back,” he murmurs, kissing along Brian’s jaw.

Brian moves so they’re eye to eye. “Yeah?”

Justin smiles, nods, brushing their noses against each other, closing his eyes. “Yeah.”

***

Brian is already awake and looking at him when Justin wakes up. He kisses Justin good morning, rolling him over into a patch of sunlight on the bed, brushing his soft golden hair back from his temples as they make out.

“Morning,” Justin mumbles, smiling, still blinking sleepily. 

Brian kisses him again. “Morning.” He props himself up next to Justin. “Last night, you said-”

Justin nods. 

“Do you- want to? Go back?”

“I- I don’t know,” Justin says. “But I think it might be a good idea, you know, to leave ourselves wanting more, so we can look forward to coming back.”

Brian grins. “What a measured and mature answer.”

“Fuck you.” Smiling, just slightly, Justin shifts to face him. “What do you want to do?”

Brian considers saying _it’s not about me_ , then doesn’t. “I like our home here, and I like our home back there too.”

He pauses, strokes along Justin’s arm. “Do you think we’ve done what we came here to do? Heal, or- or whatever?”

Justin smiles, for real, now, and kisses him. “I feel like I’ve found a part of myself that I forgot existed,” he murmurs, tracing along the side of Brian’s face.

They stay three more days, in the end, packing up and partying, and by the time they’re waiting on the platform for the train back home, Justin knows for sure that they’ve made the right decision.

“It’ll be nice to be back,” he says, glancing up at the arrivals board. “Our friends, our beach...our bed...”

Brian laughs and bumps against him. “And you say I have a one-track mind.”

Justin gives him a lascivious grin back as their train glides up with a smooth metallic whirr.

***

Because their luck has a regrettable tendency to go to shit right when things have just gotten back on track, they get a whole week of pleasant normality back home before the next big thing happens. Brian takes back all his work projects from the subordinates he’d reluctantly handed them to before they left and spends hours staring at each board before making a minuscule adjustment, only to put it back five minutes later.

Justin starts work on the counseling center portrait series, for real, this time. Sketches from the sessions end up all over the house, different strangers’ faces in different moments.

Then, just as they’ve settled in again, Justin gets a phone call.

It’s evening, so Brian’s home. Justin walks to his office, feeling as if the floor under him has become unstable, as if it might suddenly tilt to tip him into the wall.

He’s walking wrong, and he’s too pale too, breathing unsteady, and he hasn’t even made it all the way through the doorway before Brian is there, practically holding him up.

“What’s wrong?” Brian says, sharp, but stroking his back at the same time.

Justin looks at his phone. “I- they said-” he says, and Brian knows.

“You’re supposed to meet someone?”

Justin nods. “I don’t know who.”

“You have to look it up,” Brian says. “Fuck knows why.” He pulls a list of names out of the air, people they know, the access point for views into the lives of the living. Justin is twisting his hands, so Brian scans as fast as he can. Then he points.

“There,” he says. “Frances.”

Justin turns back to him, still wide-eyed and a little terrified. Brian holds him closer.

“Are you sure?” Justin whispers. 

_That it’s not Daphne, Sunshine? Yeah, I’m sure._ “As sure as I can be,” Brian says out loud. “Come on, get a jacket or something. I’ll come to the building with you.”

Justin follows him silently through the darkened house. Brian, mildly creeped out by the whole thing, makes an uncharacteristic attempt at small talk.

“Be good to see Frances again, huh?” he says, and immediately regrets his attempt at a cheerful tone. “Like old days, living together. Bet she has a cool place.”

“Yeah,” Justin says, flat and distracted.

“She’ll probably be thrilled,” Brian continues. “Can’t get much more goth than actually being dead.”

Justin glares at him, watery-eyed, and Brian winces. “Sorry.” _So much for lightening the mood_.

They leave the house in silence and walk to the bus station, then stand there next to each other in the empty terminal.

“Am I a bad person for wishing it was Daphne?” Justin says, quietly.

Brian turns to him before he’s even finished speaking, gathers him up into a close tight hug. “No,” he whispers. “No.”

He draws back so that they’re shoulder-to-shoulder, Justin a warm familiar line against his side. “When I did this for Lindsay, I wished it was you.”

Justin smiles at him, still a little wet-eyed, but less scary now, more himself. He kisses Brian on the cheek, murmurs _thank you_ , and takes his hand as the bus pulls up in front of them.


	16. Chapter 16

Because he doesn’t have an invitation, Brian can’t go inside the arrivals building. He kisses Justin goodbye right outside the door, lingering when they separate. He keeps his hands cupped around Justin’s jaw for a moment, holding his head up tall.

Justin smiles at him, soft and affectionate, but he still looks uneasy. “You’ll do great,” Brian murmurs, stroking a few stray hairs off his temples. Justin smiles wider, puts his own hands over Brian’s.

“How am I supposed to survive a whole week where we can’t even have phone sex?” he says, humor starting to sparkle back into his eyes.

Brian laughs. “I guess we’ll just have to have an extra-hot reunion when you get back,” he says. Then he yanks Justin into a deep, hard kiss, nearly dipping him horizontal. Justin rights himself, dazed, and Brian grins at him. “But that should tide you over for now.”

“Asshole,” Justin says, smiling for real now. “I love you.”

Brian rolls his eyes. “I’ll see you in a week, Sunshine.”

Justin steals one more kiss, then pulls away. “Later.”

Brian lets go of his hand as he walks to the door. “Later.”

Justin hadn’t paid much attention to the arrival lobby when he’d met Brian here, for obvious reasons, but now he just has to stand and wait, so he bides his time observing the decor. There are plants, real plants, everywhere, lush ferns and the occasional bright flower sprouting from columns and walls. There’s a waterfall on the elevator bank, the front of which tilts backwards from where it meets the ground, water running down over uneven glowing pale stone, rivuleting around still more plants. It casts a shifting light over the rest of the space, a matching rippling soundscape accompanying.

There’s a soft chime, interrupting the peaceful water sounds. Justin turns to the elevator bank, and when he sees Frances, looking the same as always, coolly studious with a strange edge of likability, he very nearly starts crying. He holds it together, mostly, because Frances looks like she might be tearing up herself, which is such an alien idea that for a moment Justin can’t think of anything else.

She doesn’t like being touched, usually, he knows, but as soon as they’re in hugging range she runs forward, so he folds her into his arms and holds her small warm body while she cries.

“It’s so good to see you,” Frances says, stepping away, snapping neatly back into her composed persona, another little tendency Justin hadn’t realized he’d been missing.

“You too,” he says, and means it.

***

“So,” Frances says, staring around at the stopped motion of the city in time-stop as they approach the street where she’ll live. “We’re dead.”

It’s the third time she’s said something to this effect, and Justin’s been around long enough now to know that it’s just one more way of dealing with the disbelief. “Yeah,” he says. “It’s pretty nice, once you get over all the weirdness.”

Frances nods, looking at a man with a scarf suspended behind him mid-flap. “No more New York,” she says, even, monotone. “That’s scary.”

Justin nods, puts a cautious arm around her. “I’m still not used to- that part of it. And I miss it. But there’s so much to explore here too.”

“Where do you live?” she says, now reaching out to touch the frozen flurry of a pile of newspapers falling out of a newsstand cart.

“On the outskirts,” Justin says. “Which is actually very close to everything, but we’re right on the beach too. It’s amazing.”

She smiles. “How far is the ocean? I can smell it, but-”

“It’s right up there,” Justin says, pointing to the flat horizon between two rows of townhouses. “Easy to get to.”

He checks the address he’s been given and stops them in front of a brick building. 

“This is it?” Frances says. It doesn’t look like a house, really, but that’s actually suitable for her, Justin thinks. “Guess so.”

“Whoa,” Frances breathes the moment they get inside, and Justin can see why. The door opens into a huge airy room with tall Parisian-style windows, easily two stories to the ceiling. It looks like a ballroom, or maybe a particularly excessive atelier, light streaming in from every side onto a glossy parquet floor.

“This is amazing,” she says, a thrilled look on her normally emotionless face, and Justin has to smile too. “We can set it up however you want,” he says, walking around the shiny floor. “And I’ll get Brian and the guys over to help after the first week. But until then, it’s just us, I guess.”

Frances smiles and comes over to hug him again. It’s a day of many firsts for her, apparently. “I’m glad-” she says, “I’m glad you’re the one they sent to meet me.”

Justin smiles back. “I am too,” he says.


	17. Chapter 17

Brian slides into the booth across from them, an alarmingly benign smile on his face.

Michael stares. “What’s up with you?”

Brian sighs - actually _sighs_ , like a lovesick teenager - and smiles even wider. “Justin and I had the best sex in human history last night.”

“Okay...” Michael says, still more than a little unnerved by Brian’s dreamy expression.

“I don’t think I’m impressing properly,” Brian says, twirling his spoon around, “just how fucking fantastic it was. I mean, you know I know sex, Mikey, and I would have thought that after all this time I wouldn’t be able to be surprised, and yet...” He sighs again, gazing vaguely at the spoon.

“I think an alien’s taken over his brain,” Emmett whispers. Michael can’t entirely disagree.

Justin comes into the café and spots them. “Car’s two streets over,” he says, and Brian pulls him into the booth next to him, nuzzling greedily at his temple. “Who let you get this fucking gorgeous?” he murmurs - he actually wants to say _I can still feel you inside me_ , but he has just enough self-preservation instincts still functioning to stop himself - and Justin laughs and kisses him.

“You broke him,” Michael says, a little more accusatorily than he intended. Justin looks disgustingly smug, though, so he doesn’t feel especially bad about it.

“I told you they’d be freaked out,” he says, grinning, to Brian. Brian just presses closer, tugs him into another messy heated kiss. “Not my fault I can’t think of anything else when you’re around,” he says, mostly into Justin’s ear, but it still gets him another round of stares from the other side of the table.

Debbie comes over. “What’s up with you two?” she says, to Emmett and Michael, still watching Brian with perplexed fascination.

“They’re alarmed by our happiness,” Brian says, smirking. “I mean, we’re young and in love, boys, what do you expect?” Justin snorts, kisses him again, even longer this time, pushing one hand through Brian’s hair. Brian doesn’t even muss it back into place when they separate.

Debbie grins. “Someone got laid last night.”

“Ma!” Michael says, as if he’s surprised.

“I get laid every night,” Brian says, stretching comfortably in the booth before wrapping around Justin again. “We’re just happy.”

Debbie stares at him for a moment. “Huh.”

Brian’s texting, that blissed-out smile still there. He sends whatever it is he’s typing and goes back to melting against Justin.

Justin looks down when his phone buzzes, sees **I want you to come on my face** on the screen, and growls, softly, running blunt nails over Brian’s scalp. Brian tries very hard not to whimper, but it doesn’t stop the others from staring at them as if they’ve each grown an extra arm.

“Want anything, Sunshine?” Debbie’s saying. 

Justin gives her a big sunny smile. “We just stopped in to say hi. Lots to do today.” He stands up and Brian follows, practically glued to his back.

“Oh,” Debbie says, frowning. “Well, it’s always good to see you two, you know that.”

Justin kisses her on the cheek. “We’ll be there at dinner this week, don’t worry.” he says, and she smiles and ruffles his hair. 

Debbie turns to Emmett to take his order, then looks back to ask the boys if they want something to go, but the door’s already closing behind them.

***

The night before, they’re at this art-and-activism thing in the grand ballroom of a swanky downtown hotel, and Justin is beautiful. He’s slipped easily back into the persona he developed through the years of hustling in New York galleries before he made it, charming everyone who comes up to fawn over him, drawing them in with that vibrant electric energy he has. The wordy critic who reviewed him in ArtForum a million years ago had said that the thing that set Justin’s work apart was sex appeal, and Brian of all people isn’t going to challenge that, but there’s something else too, maybe something that’s invisible to anyone who doesn’t really know Justin, a pulsing shining vitality that cuts through all the everyday bullshit, makes everything new again.

“It’s about finding new ways to tell the kinds of history they didn’t teach us in school,” Justin’s saying as Brian returns with a refreshed glass of prosecco - what is it with arty types and godawful drink choices? - speaking to a crowd that’s gathered around a collection of sketches and half-finished paintings, all from different projects, his stock of procrastinated-on work, donated for the evening. 

“How do you express what it means to have a history that’s hidden, deleted, ignored?” Justin says, to his rapt audience, and Brian joins them, gives him a wink. Justin flashes him a quick brilliant smile before he continues. “When your own right to live as yourself comes not from a bunch of old men in a stuffy room but from people whose names you’ve never heard rioting and blocking streets and holding secret meetings and swarming the steps of the Supreme Court to demand that they be recognized as human beings?”

Justin walks closer to the group, gestures at the collage of work behind him. “I’ve been working for most of my life on learning how to make people see those things. I want to show all of it, the love and the blood and the fury that we couldn’t show in our everyday lives, because it’s still there, we know it’s still there, probably always will be, and we can’t move forward without talking about it, getting it out.”

When he’s done, the still-growing crowd watching him actually applauds, and there’s a long string of admirers there to drool over him, asking questions or asking for an autograph, and Justin stands there, not just glowing but _shining_ , lighting up the whole room as the line gradually dissipates.

“Just so you know,” Brian murmurs, coming up behind him to bite at his ear when the flow of fans has finally dried up, “if we weren’t already married I’d propose to you right now.”

****

Still flying on adrenaline, the way he always gets when he gives one of those home-run talks, Justin spins around and frenches him furiously, tangling his hands in Brian’s hair and tilting his head to push his tongue in deeper. “Feel like a detour?” he says, tongue caught between his front teeth when he pulls away. Brian makes a noise that he’ll never admit to, then follows eagerly as Justin drags him to the bathrooms.

****

He’s being slammed against the inside of one of the cushy gilded bathroom doors before he knows it, on the receiving end of his own seduction technique, and Justin is consuming his mouth again. 

****

“So,” Justin pants, in between kisses. “Here’s what’s going to happen.” Brian whimpers, and Justin dives at him, devours him for a few more seconds before pulling back. “You’re going to fuck me into next week.” He unzips Brian’s fly, pulls out his throbbing dick. “You’re not going to stop until I come screaming all over you.” Brian bites his own tongue to hold in a sob, and Justin just presses even closer, their lips brushing together when he speaks, undoing his own pants as he does. “And then when we’re done, we’ll go out there, make a few more pleasantries, and then go home so I can tie you up and make you come until you forget your name.” Brian moans before he can stop himself, eyes dilated. Justin bites his neck, whispers, “I’m going to make you feel so _good_ ,” turning them so Brian’s pressing him up against the door. Justin wraps his arms around Brian, hitches one leg up around his waist, and Brian knows exactly what he wants, even high out of his mind on drunken helpless lust, so he grabs Justin’s tight round ass and lifts him up, and Justin grins, predatory, and hooks his ankles together at the small of Brian’s back.

It’s not until they’re coming back down, slumped against the door together, panting, that Brian stops kissing him and says, “Wait. _You_ want to tie _me_ up?”

Still straining forward, struggling for Brian’s mouth back to his, Justin replays their previous conversation in his head.

 _Shit_.

“Um,” he says. “I. Um.”

Brian is giving him that amused, razor-sharp I-see-right-through-you look that can either infuriate him or weaken his knees until he’s on the floor with Brian’s cock down his throat, depending on the circumstances. Justin takes a breath.

“Yes?” he says. “Yes. But I know you don’t- I shouldn’t have-”

Brian cuts him off with a kiss. “You know you can tell me anything,” he says, when he pulls away. “I’ll think about it. I’m not saying no.”

Justin’s aware he’s gaping like a beached salmon, but it’s not like he can give that a deadpan response. “You’re not?”

Brian chuckles and leans in to nip at his jaw. “I’m not.”

“Um,” Justin says again. “Okay.”

Brian smirks. “Okay?”

“I- would you stop looking at me like that?” Justin says, trying to clear his head with a nice familiar dose of aggravation. “I can’t think when you-”

Brian kisses him, crushing him up against the door, a good kiss, a sex kiss, tongue rubbing against the inside of his mouth in all the right ways. “We should get back,” he murmurs, right against Justin’s parted lips. “People are probably wondering where we’ve gone.”

“If they know us, they’ll guess,” Justin says, unable to stop staring at Brian’s mouth, feeling like a teenager all over again.

Brian laughs at him, kisses him one more time before pulling him back to his feet and smoothing down his hair. Still feeling dazed, Justin follows him reluctantly out the door. 

Half an hour later, having mostly coaxed away the remains of a very stubborn erection, Justin’s pretending to study a display of posters when Brian comes up behind him. 

“I’m not calling you ‘sir,’ or- or ‘master,’ or any shit like that,” Brian says. “And no pain stuff. Or punishment.”

Justin clenches both hands in his pockets, feeling a little like he’s hallucinating. He lets go and turns around.

“You- uh-”

“I want to try it,” Brian says. “See what it’s like.” He brushes his lips down the side of Justin’s face. “I trust you.”

Justin can’t hold in a soft gasp, and Brian smiles his beautiful vulnerable open smile and kisses him on the mouth, hands sliding around Justin’s back, fingers teasing at the hem of his jeans.

“I love you,” Justin whispers, eyes closed, and Brian breathes out a small gentle sigh and kisses him again. 

“Want to get out of here?” he says, playful smirk back now, when he pulls away.

“Oh, God, yes,” Justin says, and Brian grins as he takes his hand and leads him through the packed room to the door.

The bus ride home is strange and silent. Brian holds onto his hand tightly, and there’s a faint, near-invisible red flush high on his cheekbones. He’s breathtaking, and for the first time Justin lets himself really start to think about what he’ll do with Brian totally at his mercy. 

They stumble into the house, kissing, undressing on their way. When they cross the threshold into the bedroom, Justin kisses Brian once, deep and soft and slow, murmurs, “Same safeword as usual?”, and Brian nods just a little frantically.

Justin is so hard he can barely think more than a few steps ahead, but he forces it down, focuses on emulating the alpha-male demeanor Brian uses on him.

“I need you on the bed,” he tells Brian, right up against his ear. “On your back, hands over your head.” Brian closes his eyes, breathes in and out, once, and then goes to lie down.

Justin goes to the toy drawer, pulls out the most comfortable pair of cuffs they own, holds them up. Brian nods and allows Justin to fasten his hands to the headboard.

Justin moves to straddle his waist. He leans forward until he’s lying flat on top of Brian and kisses him, hard, pushing his tongue into his mouth. Then he pulls back.

 _Holy shit, we’re really doing this_ , Justin thinks, suddenly overflowing with love and need at the amazing unimaginably trusting look in Brian’s eyes. “I’m going to make you feel so good,” he breathes, for the second time that night, and Brian smiles up at him, soft and warm, stretching lightly against the restraints. 

Brian’s expression shifts to something a little more hesitant, so Justin gives him a questioning look. When Brian still doesn’t say anything, he nudges his chin. “What is it?”

Brian sighs. “Just- take it easy, at first, okay?”

Justin beams down at him - proudly, Brian could swear it - and ducks down for another kiss. “Of course,” he whispers. 

Then he sits back up, reaches for the bottle on the side of the bed, starts stretching himself open. “I don’t want you to come until I say so.”

Brian groans, and Justin laughs, softly. “I know,” he says, soothing, “believe me, I know. But I promise it’ll be worth it.”

He sits back, lines himself up on top of Brian’s stiff cock. He strokes Brian’s face. “Ready?” he says, and Brian nods, and Justin slides down onto him, starts rocking on top of him, making tiny pleased noises whenever he finds a new angle he likes.

It’s not long until he’s dripping, mouth open, head tilted back, and Brian wants more than anything to reach forward and jack him off, nice and slow, can imagine exactly the noise Justin will make when Brian’s hand touches his dick. But Brian can’t do that, can’t do anything but just lie there and watch him, and it’s strange wonderful torture, because he knows, of course he knows, that Justin will always do his best to take care of him, and now he has no choice but to let him.

Justin comes untouched, moaning, taking greedy handfuls of Brian’s hair as he yanks him up for a rough kiss as he finishes. Brian lies back, covered in his come, still desperately hard, trying to hold back from pleading. “I needed that,” Justin sighs, stroking his face. “Now let’s take care of you.”

Justin starts kissing slowly, far too slowly, down his chest, and then he slides back up. “But don’t come yet,” he says, before returning to his place on Brian’s stomach. Brian allows himself a tiny whimper, and then Justin is hovering over him again.

“And none of this- holding back to preserve your reputation, okay?” he says, eyes threatening to start blazing. “I want to hear all of it, and you know I don’t care if it doesn’t match how you like the world to see you. Got it?”

Brian nods, smiling wryly. “You’re a bossy little shit, you know that?”

Justin grins, dips down to bite, hard, at his neck. Brian moans. “You think _this_ is bossy?” Justin murmurs. “Just wait.”

Brian laughs, turning into a low happy groan as Justin slithers down his torso again, licking teasingly around his hipbones, the insides of his thighs. He raises his hips off the bed, desperate, and Justin puts a firm hand on his body and pushes him back down. “Uh-uh,” he says, smirking, coming up to kiss him again. “None of that, okay?”

“So many _rules_ ,” Brian says, trying for overdramatic but squeaking on the last word when Justin slips one fingertip into his ass.

“Mmmm,” Justin says, breathing deep against the side of his neck. “I wanna _eat_ you.” 

Brian tries his best not to wriggle. “Get on with it, then,” he says, and Justin laughs. “Sure you won’t come?”

“I’m sure,” Brian says. Justin grins, knowing, at him, and then sits back on his heels, putting Brian’s legs up on his shoulders as he does.

As with every other kind of sex, Justin is devastatingly talented at rimming, and the hungry involuntary-sounding noises he makes while he does it are just the icing on the wickedly luscious cake. Now, he licks right into Brian without hesitation, making him strain against the cuffs and arch his back, sweet slick dark pleasure suffusing him. 

He starts to beg earlier than he’d intended, much earlier. Justin sits up again, wipes his mouth, and winks, then starts fingering him open in earnest.

Usually, Brian likes to get this part over with quickly, so they can get on with the fucking, but now Justin kisses him slow and warm while he opens him up with slim experienced fingers. When he slides in, fucking finally, Brian is so loose and relaxed that it barely burns, just beautiful slippery friction already starting to build.

“I-” Brian says, as Justin starts to move faster, shifting into a deep grinding rhythm that makes him feel like his brain’s about to liquefy and drip out of his ears, “I- please, Justin-”

“You need to come?” Justin says, face in his neck. Brian nods, too fast, desperate, and Justin moans. “Go ahead,” he murmurs, the way he sounds when he’s starting to go out of his mind with lust. “You’ve been so good for me, my beautiful man, Brian-”

He says more after that, more sweet gentle praise just for Brian, but Brian can barely hear it over the force of an orgasm that’s been percolating since before they got home. Justin fucks him through it, stroking reverently along his sides with one hand and jerking him smoothly with the other. Brian whimpers when it gets to be too much, but Justin just keeps going, harder, now, ramming into him with the kind of force that’d make your teeth rattle against a backroom wall, more of a deep heavy pounding thump of a feeling in their soft bed. 

He’s whining, he thinks, and Justin whispers, “Want me to stop?”, and he realizes that he doesn’t, that he wants Justin to fuck him until at least one of them can’t move, to know what it’s like to be pounded into nothing but a happy satisfied puddle on the mattress. 

“Don’t stop,” Brian gasps back, feeling frantic. “Don’t stop, don’t stop, Justin, please-”

Justin cuts him off by licking his mouth open with a sweet dirty force that makes Brian want to open himself up for him, let Justin see everything he’s ever hidden from the world, let him brighten the darkest inside parts of him.

He tries to say _I love you_ , to stroke Justin’s gorgeous determined face, but he can’t make his mouth form the words and his hands are still tied to the headboard, so he settles for a long low howl, joy and passion and painfully desperate want all in one. 

Brian doesn’t know how long Justin fucks him for, or how many more times he comes. He’s just aware that he’s floating in a deep all-consuming pleasure that he’s never felt before, a warm contentedness even as orgasms shred his body over and over and over again, Justin staring at him with crazed awe, fucking him harder and harder and harder until he can’t take it anymore, and Brian watches him come through slitted eyes, gasping in air. Justin spreads him roughly open and cleans him up with his tongue when he’s done, making Brian squirm and shiver and whine, and then he’s in him again, holding him tight and starting up all over again, bringing him right to the edge and over without really having to try.

By the time Justin flops down onto his chest, Brian can barely feel his own toes.

Justin’s clearly not in total control of his motor facilities yet, but he’s pushing himself up anyway, stroking Brian all over, telling him how good he is, how beautiful, how much he loves him. Brian can’t speak yet, so instead he smiles and lets the flood of endorphins drench him.

When he comes down from it, Brian can hardly breathe. He clutches at Justin, whispers _oh my God_ and _thank you_ and _I had no idea_. Justin kisses him in the tangled sheets, helps him limp to the shower and holds him up while they wash each other’s bruised, bitten bodies. Brian feels like he’s levitating a foot off the ground.

They go back to bed clinging to each other, not really able to believe what they’ve just done.

“I didn’t think I had anything new left to discover,” Brian whispers, just before they fall asleep. “I know,” Justin whispers back, and kisses him.

***

“You’re so hot,” Brian’s moaning, shoving him up against the brick siding of the alleyway outside the café. “Mmmm, fuck, the things I’d let you do to me.”

Justin grins, letting his head roll back as Brian goes to work on his throat. When Brian comes back up for another bite at his mouth, Justin presses his lips to his ear and purrs, “If you can make me come in the next two minutes, when we get home I’ll chain you to that wireframe chair in my studio and ride you until we both pass out.”

Brian’s on his knees before Justin’s even done speaking, hands skittering to his fly, pulling him out of his jeans and groaning hungrily against his stomach. He looks up, pupils two huge black circles, and brings Justin’s hands to the back of his head before swallowing him down.

Justin laughs darkly, making Brian whimper around his dick. “I love seeing you gagging for it,” Justin tells him, and Brian moans, takes him in even deeper. “So good for me, Brian, you’re so good, so hot, so-”

Several hours later, they’re spread over the rug in Justin’s studio. Brian is quivering, drawing short shaky breaths, so Justin crawls onto his chest and kisses him and strokes him until he floats back down to earth. 

“I love you,” Brian whispers, when he’s still. Justin smiles down and kisses him, warm and deep. 

“I’ll run a bath,” he murmurs. Brian grins and stretches luxuriously, says, “All those years of hot, indulgent aftercare, and you never told me how good it feels?”

Justin just rolls his eyes and helps Brian to his feet. They both know why he didn’t, so it’s not really worth discussing, not when they have so many better things to do.

Freshly cleaned and dried off with the plushy oversized towels Brian insists on stocking the bathroom with, they fall into bed, laughing and kissing.

Justin hums into his neck as they tumble over on the mattress. “Tell you what,” he murmurs. “Pick out something from the toy drawer, anything you want, and I’ll go get us some ice water, and when I get back we’ll start the next round, okay?”

Brian grins and kisses him, rough and demanding. “I’ll take that as a yes,” Justin says, grinning, and he laughs.

When Justin leaves the bedroom, Brian settles back for a moment, whole body aching, thinking about what lies ahead for the rest of the day, how he’ll use this entire encyclopedia of new knowledge to absolutely fucking _ruin_ Justin the next time it’s his turn to play submissive.

Then Justin’s phone starts buzzing. 

“Someone’s calling!” Brian yells, hoarse, through to the kitchen.

“Tell them to fuck off,” Justin shouts back, smiling to himself, loading a pitcher and glasses onto a tray.

When he gets back to the room, Brian doesn’t have anything in front of him, and the drawer is shut. Brian’s face is- not cold, or pale, exactly, but drawn in a way that ages him, makes some deep darkness come through his eyes.

“Hey,” Justin says, soft, putting the tray down and rushing over to sit next to him on the bed. “Everything okay?”

“Fine,” Brian says, with a smile that doesn’t clear any of the distance from his face. “We might have to postpone the evening’s activities, though.” 

He takes Justin’s right hand, draws it to his mouth for a kiss. “Asher’s here.”


	18. Chapter 18

Justin can’t decide what to wear. He’s trying to hide it, maybe, but Brian can tell, the way his fingertips hesitate as he brushes through a drawer of shirts. Brian, dressed now, comes up to him, starts to rub his shoulders, and Justin sighs, faint and tired. 

“This one,” Brian murmurs, reaching around him to pick up a soft heathered blue-gray T-shirt. “Brings out your eyes.”

Justin sighs again, just as involuntary as before, and turns to face him, hands on Brian’s shoulders, now. “I-” he says, and stops, looking at him with deep conflicted eyes, and it makes Brian’s heart clench to see the pain on his face.

“It’s okay,” he says, resting their foreheads together. “I understand.”

Justin crushes himself to him then, kisses Brian with a feverish white-hot need, until Brian can’t tell where he ends and Justin begins. 

“I love you,” Justin breathes, when he has to come up for air. “So fucking much, Brian, God, I-” 

Brian smiles at him, and he knows it doesn’t really reach his eyes but he’s trying his goddamn best here, and presses the shirt to Justin’s bare chest, leans down for one more quick kiss, gives him an affectionate slap on the ass and tells him to hurry up, and Justin laughs, sounding like himself for the first time since he came back into the bedroom to learn that his post-Brian’s-death earth boyfriend had arrived.

They drive over in silence, Brian at the wheel, Justin nearly quivering, foreign energy buzzing beneath his skin. Brian is keeping his eyes on the road and his hands at ten and two, forcefully not paying attention to the clamoring riot of doomsday thoughts he’d intended not to have when this day came.

Justin doesn’t know what to feel. He’s excited, he thinks, at the prospect of seeing Asher again, but there’s trepidation there too, of all four of them, he and Asher and their lifelong loves, being in one room at the same time. Brian is being shatteringly sweet and attentive, all gentle words and quiet familiar loving touches, although Justin has more than a vague idea of what he might be hiding away right now. Justin looks over at him, elegant face outlined in moonlight as he drives them along the beach road, wishing that this could have happened- when? Sooner, later? At a time when Brian hadn’t just opened up a whole new part of himself, allowed Justin to take care of him in a way he’s never experienced, for one. Justin can’t spare too much thought to how Brian had looked bound under him, wasted on sex, pleading for Justin’s cock even as he struggled to get it up for the fourth, fifth, sixth times, because if he does he’ll beg Brian to turn the car around right now so they can go home and hide under a shelter of plush warm blankets and fuck each other’s brains out until neither of them knows what worry is.

The Jeep pulls up in front of Jordan’s lake house - Jordan _and Asher’s_ lake house, Justin thinks - and Justin climbs out. Brian is around the passenger side of the Jeep and taking his hand before he’s even taken a full breath of the quiet lakeshore air. He kisses Justin’s cheek. “Ready?”

Justin nods, puts an arm around Brian before they start to walk up to the house. 

He rings the doorbell and Asher answers, younger than Justin’s ever seen him, sandy brown hair and warm grey eyes with none of the crows’ feet or salt-and-pepper bangs he’d had when they met. “Hi, J,” Asher says, smiling warmly at him - it’d been the first thing that made Justin want him, that smile, the way it fills you up with unfamiliar peace - before pulling him into a tight warm hug. Justin feels himself tearing up, no warning at all. “I’m sorry for leaving you behind,” he whispers, just before they move apart.

“I’m here now,” Asher says back, still young, still smiling. “You look good. You look _great_.”

Justin laughs, resists the urge to stroke his hair. “I could say the same for you.” He pauses, looks back at Brian, lingering a short distance back on the porch. “I want you to meet-”

“Brian,” Asher says, face lighting up, walking out to shake his hand - he remembers enough not to try for a hug, then. “Justin told me so much about you.”

Brian smiles at him, not one of his genuine soul-illuminating joyful smiles but not a terrifying wolfy grin either, so he’s trying, Justin knows. “I’m glad he wasn’t- alone, down there. So thank you.”

Asher nods, still beaming, the newly-reunited look that Justin is sure Jordan will be wearing too, and he gestures for them both to follow as he leads them back through the front door.

Inside, the house glows with warmth and love. Jordan keeps pressing little kisses to Asher’s cheek, as if he’s checking that he’s really there, that this isn’t an exceptionally cruel dream. Brian can sympathize, a feeling he didn’t expect to be having tonight.

Asher’s been sculpting over their grace week, and pieces of his work are scattered around the house, concentrating on a porchlike studio around the back. Brian can’t stop himself from smiling for real at that and murmuring to Justin, “So it _is_ an artist thing. All this time I’ve been thinking it was just you being a slob,” and Justin laughs and smacks him, and the other two laugh along, and Brian has absolutely no fucking idea what to do with how _normal_ it all feels, how all the terrifying images of losing Justin are fading away in the face of Justin’s real-life body warm and tangible next to him, fond hands messing with his hair and rumpling his clothes, exactly like he’s used to.

They bid the happy couple farewell soon after, and Brian is dizzy from the lightness in his chest as they walk back down to the Jeep.

“They seem happy,” he says, as the car squeals out onto the road again. Justin smiles and rests his head on Brian’s shoulder. “It reminds me of us, right after I got here,” he murmurs. “Deliriously happy, all the time.”

“Who says we’re not like that now?” Brian says, smirking.

Justin grins and bites at his neck. “Did I say we weren’t?”

They share a look, just for a moment, and then they both burst out laughing. Then Justin takes his hand across the gearshift, kisses his cheek before pulling back to look at him.

“I’m saying this because I know you, not because I think I need to say it, but I want you to hear it, okay?” he says, and Brian doesn’t turn his head or anything else, but Justin feels all of his attention shift, a fearful helpless vibration spreading over his still body.

“I am _yours_ ,” Justin says, stroking Brian’s cheek, feeling a tiny muscle twitch under his hand. “I’ve already been yours for one eternity, and I’ll stay that way for as many more as exist. Got it?”

Brian swallows, squeezes Justin’s other hand, doesn’t say anything for a long moment.

“Got it,” he whispers, hoarse, finally. “Yeah.”

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> this isn’t the end of this arc, spoiler alert, but I’m also not one to manufacture drama where I don’t believe there would be much, so yay! happy warm squishy story for all today.


	19. Chapter 19

It starts with little things, Brian staying in and cooking dinner a few nights in a row, not complaining about Justin leaving his shit everywhere, ignoring waiting stacks of branding mood boards in favor of asking Justin he wants to go for a walk on the beach. Justin doesn’t think he’s ever been this fucking confused.

But he may have set that bar too low, because soon after Brian starts leaving lovey-dovey notes on the fridge and not bitching about the upholstery when Justin lets the cats into the house.

 _You need to find out what’s wrong with him_ , Justin thinks when he finds the fourth note - **got that pasta thing you like, be back at five, I love you, Brian** \- in three days.

_You know what. And he’s just being-_

_Considerate? This is not Brian being considerate, it’s a normal person being considerate._

_So?_

_So the last time he tried to imitate his idea of normal life was-_

_Don’t._

_No, but-_

_Stop._

_But the last time he did this was-_

_Before the wedding that never was? Is that what you’re going to say? Because he’s-_

_-evolved, fine, but don’t tell me you think this is a good thing, because it’s not._

_So your dead ex shows up and he goes a little weird. Correlation does not imply causation, as you should know from spending four years living with a data analyst._

_Don’t tell me you believe that._

_Fine, I won’t._

_I should talk to him._

_About what?_

_About how he’s trying to win me back from an ex-boyfriend I am not going back to, how about that?_

_That is not-_

_It’s exactly what he’s doing, and you’d be an idiot to think otherwise._

Justin groans and rests his head against the cool tiled kitchen wall. He can’t talk about it with Asher, because this isn’t Asher’s problem, and he can’t talk about it with Brian, because Brian is Brian, and he needs Daphne and he needs Daphne and he needs Daphne.

Fuck it, he thinks, and heads for the door. He has more than one friend, and luckily for him, most of them are dead.

***

Frances is surrounded by books when he arrives at the townhouse. “I’m making a library in the basement,” she says, in response to his questioning look. “Wanted a little fortress to hang out in. What’s up?”

Justin sighs, stepping over a copy of _Sharp Objects_. “Brian’s being strange.”

Frances takes that in, studying him. “Because of Asher?”

Justin winces. “Yeah? I don’t know. Maybe.”

“What’s he doing?”

“Just-” Justin says. “I don’t know. Weird stuff. Couple-y stuff.”

Frances frowns. “Brian does couple-y stuff with you all the time.”

“Not- like this. He’s being ... very romantic.”

“We’re talking about the guy who bought you a multimillion-dollar mansion, right?”

“That’s exactly what I’m scared of,” Justin says. “That he’s doing- whatever that was. Again.”

Frances stacks a few Penguin Classics Editions. “I mean, it’s not like he didn’t practically build you a house while he was waiting for you here. Maybe this is just a thing he does now.”

Justin sighs, again. “Yeah, maybe.”

***

Debbie greets him with lemon cake and a rib-crushing hug. “Hon, Sunshine’s here!” she yells, presumably to Carl. Internally, Justin cringes.

“I was actually hoping I could talk to you alone,” he says. “Just for a little.”

Debbie tugs him into the house, looking concerned. “Of course, honey, what’s wrong?”

Justin waits until they’re sitting at the kitchen table to explain. When he’s done, Debbie stares at him.

“So,” she says. “You think Brian’s- what? Turning into a romantic? Because if I’m being honest, that happened the day he stopped pretending he didn’t want you around.”

“I- yeah. Sure. But he’s leaving me notes on the fridge, just to tell me he loves me. It’s beyond weird.”

Debbie still looks confused. “Sunshine, I think that’s just what people who live together do. He’s never left you a note before?”

Justin groans. “Not- picking up my favorite takeout that’s forty minutes out of his way home from work and signing off with I love you on all of them. That’s not Brian.”

“Are you sure?” Debbie says. “In the grand scheme of things, it wasn’t all that long ago that you would have killed for Brian to show affection like that. Maybe he knows.”

“Maybe,” Justin says, still exactly as conflicted as he’s been all day.

***

His mother is even less help than the first two.

“That’s so _sweet_ ,” she says, smiling, when Justin tells her about the love notes. “Took him long enough to get there, but Brian really did turn into the perfect man for you, didn’t he?”

It’s already been too long of a day and Justin has explained this too fucking many times, so he just nods and smiles along. “Perfect,” he says. “Exactly.”

The sky is gloomy when he leaves, perfect for a long walk through the city, so he takes one, exploring a few new neighborhoods he hasn’t had the chance to look at yet, eventually wandering up to a park off one of the piers. There’s no one else there, probably driven off by the threat of rain, so he opens up an earth view window right where he’s sitting.

Daphne is cooking dinner, it looks like, singing along to the radio, occasionally saying something to someone offscreen, Mark, the husband, probably. “You’re the only one who’d get it,” Justin tells her, reaching out to touch the screen. His hand goes right through, as it always does. “You always were.”

Daphne just keeps on laughing and dancing, years and miles and units of distance he doesn’t have words for between them. “Bye, Daph,” Justin says, quiet, and closes the window.

He starts on his walk back, the long way home, walking beside the ocean with the image of Daphne alive and happy for company, wondering what the fuck he’s going to say to Brian.

He’d hoped the long walk home would give him plenty of time to think, no people or cars around for distraction. But as it turns out, he has to start focusing on more present issues when the sky cracks open and dumps what seems like a thousand gallons of freezing rain onto his head.

***

“Jesus,” Brian says, when he stumbles through the door, jumping up off the couch to help Justin out of his wet clothes, stripping off his own shirt and pulling Justin close against his warm chest. “What the hell happened?”

Justin shrugs, inhaling deeply into Brian’s skin, sizzling hot against his frozen face. He doesn’t want to talk.

Brian kisses the top of his sopping head, then starts leading him gently to the sofa. He wraps Justin up in a fluffy blanket, kisses him again, and dashes off back into the house. _The moment he gets back, you’re telling him_ , Justin thinks.

But when Brian returns, it’s to announce that he’s running a bath, as he peels Justin off the sofa and basically carries him to the bathroom, and Justin is shivering and exhausted and it feels so good to be cared for that he can’t bear to do anything that might make Brian stop.

“Warming up?” Brian says, settling back in the tub with Justin against his chest, kissing along one side of his neck. “Mmm-hmm,” Justin says, hating himself.

Brian starts soaping his hair, gently massaging his scalp with sure strong fingers, body wrapping protectively around him, and Justin loves him so much it feels like it’s tearing him to pieces.

“You know you don’t have to compete with him, right?” Justin says, finally, when he can’t take it anymore.

Brian frowns, stopping halfway up the path he’s been tracing over Justin’s collarbone. “Compete? Compete with who?”

Justin signs. “You know who.”

Brian turns his head so they’re looking at each other. “No, I really don’t.”

Justin grits his teeth and looks away for a second before he answers. “You don’t have to compete with Asher. On anyone else. What you give me, it’s not-”

But Brian is still looking perplexedly at him. “Asher? What does he have to do with anything?”

“The notes?” Justin says, really getting exasperated now. “The cooking, the laying off telling me to stop leaving dirty socks on the couch, all those things?”

Brian is laughing at him now, softly, trying to hold it back, Justin can tell, but he’s not doing a very good job of it.

“You thought I was- in some contest with a guy you’ve told me you’re not interested in like that anymore?” he says.

Justin glares. “What else was I supposed to think? You don’t- do this.”

Brian brushes his lips down the back of Justin’s neck then, humor fading from him a little. “Do what?” He says. “I’ve seen how heavy some of this portrait stuff you’re doing is,” he says. “I was just trying to make things a little easier on you while you’re in the most intense part of the project. Remind you that I’m- here for you.”

Justin stares at him for a moment, then bursts out laughing when he’s spent a long enough time processing it.

“We’re the worst romantics of all time,” Justin says, still giggling a little, pressing back comfortably against Brian.

“I don’t know,” Brian murmurs, pulling him even closer. “I think we’re doing pretty good.”

***

Justin comes home looking pissy the following afternoon, the special frustrated anger that can only mean artist’s block, so Brian doesn’t bother asking what’s wrong, just walks him over to the kitchen counter and kisses him against it until he’s gasping. Brian knows what he needs, cheap, hard, easy sex, the only thing to wipe away all the bullshit, and he’ll give Justin that and never judge him for it. Brian of all people knows that sometimes the unconventional way of doing things is also the best.

He smashes their faces back together when Justin’s drawn in a shuddery breath, pulls off both their shirts, rakes manicured nails down his sides. Brian draws back to look at him, already well on his way to distraction, big round glazed eyes, mouth dropping open, and leans forward until his lips are on Justin’s ear.

“On your knees,” he murmurs, velvet, and Justin drops so fast he very nearly brains himself on the countertop. He’s pulling Brian out of his slacks before he can even make sure Justin’s okay, and then he’s slurping him down, licking and sucking like it’s air and he’s drowning.

He cups a hand around Justin’s head, holds himself steady on the countertop with the other, pushes into his mouth a few times. Justin moans, frantic, nearly hysterical, and swallows him to the base, and Brian laughs, darkly satisfied. It’s sex but it’s more than sex, and they can both feel it, he knows, and then he stops bothering with philosophical thought because Justin is sucking him like a fucking Dyson and there’s no room in his mind for anything else.

Justin’s back on his feet the moment Brian’s finished, kissing him, sloppy and needy, pushing him over to the couch, jerking his softening cock, eyes desperate, and Brian calls on every ounce of his powers to recover as fast as he possibly can.

He opens Justin up roughly, too many fingers at the start, and Justin loves it, laughing his slutty pleasure-thickened sex-laugh, taunting him, spread open over the cushions, whole body pulsing with need. Brian very nearly says a prayer of gratitude when he’s all the way hard again, and when he pushes in Justin tosses his head back, streams of tight soft whimpers sliding out of him. Brian rolls his hips and Justin snarls _FUCK_ and pushes back, and it’s not long before they’re writhing in a rough filthy uneven rhythm, bodies flush together, pink from friction and exertion. It’s rough and pornographic and shameless, them groaning into each other’s mouths, Brian snapping his hips hard enough that Justin can barely inhale because each new thrust knocks all of the breath out of his body. Brian has his eyes open, staring down at him as he takes him apart, and it’s been a long time since Justin felt this much like his plaything, being watched while he goes out of his mind. He’s almost surprised at how much he needs it.

Justin gulps in air when he comes, eyes rolling back, clasping around Brian everywhere. Brian kisses him through it, never letting up, and tightens his grip on his shoulders, his waist, holds his body steady.

They wind up spread-eagled on the deep-pile rug in the sunporch an hour or two later, exhausted. Brian runs a finger down the side of Justin’s heaving chest, rolls them onto their sides and kisses him.

“You’re so-” Justin says, still a little dazed, and then immediately loses his train of thought, pulling Brian down closer against him. “Fuck. I’m not gonna be able to sit down for a week.”

Brian grins, nips at him. “Mmmm-hmm.”

Justin smiles, feeling better than he has in a week. “I’m an idiot, aren’t I?”

“Not usually,” Brian murmurs, grinning against his cheek. “But maybe a little, recently. Yeah.”

***

The next day, Justin’s making coffee when he spots another note on the fridge. He walks over to read it, then bursts out laughing loudly enough to startle the big fluffy cat out of his peaceful sleep on the sofa.

**Morning, Sunshine. Can’t wait to get home so I can rail your tight little ass until you’re screaming bloody murder. I love you.**


	20. Chapter 20

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> remember in part 2 where I listed a number of slightly improbable things Brian did in the afterlife before Justin arrived? well, my inner plot-whore is refusing to let this series continue without at least a couple flashbacks to flesh them out, and I’m getting kinda into this nonchronological thing I have going here, so here’s the first of an unknown number of installments on the theme of Brian Becomes the Best Dead Homosexual He Can Possibly Be.

Brian is feeling less than great at the moment Mel shows up. He’s just watched a memory of the day he’d agreed to move to New York, him and Justin screwing giddily on the floor of the Manhattan condo, and now he’s looking at current-day Justin painting an ethereal skyline on a huge long skinny canvas, alone in his studio, and Brian wants him so badly it feels like he’s put his heart into a paper shredder. It hurts to watch and he can’t stop watching, so when the doorbell rings he tears himself away, shuts the screen, arranges his face into something cool and unfriendly.

Because he feels like shit at the moment, when Mel holds up the bottle of scotch, red-eyed, Brian doesn’t ask any questions, just waves her in.

They’re about four shots deep before either of them talks. 

“She fucking _walked out_ ,” Mel says, apparently to the ceiling.

Brian is not feeling very charitable, even if Mel did bring booze, so he smiles a slow nasty smile over at her. “Okay,” he says, “what’d you do?”

Mel looks like she might hit him. Brian considers moving, but the current risks don’t outweigh the benefits, so he doesn’t.

Then she bursts into tears, actually sobbing, doubling over on the sofa, shoulders shaking.

“The fuck?” Brian says.

Mel doesn’t respond, too busy with her one-woman waterworks show.

Brian pinches the bridge of his nose, curses the universe, and goes to sit next to- well, two feet away from Mel.

He pats her cautiously on the shoulder. “You ... okay?” he says. Stupid question.

“I _told_ her to _leave_ ,” Mel bawls. “We were having this- fight, just something stupid, and it got out of hand and I said ‘if you don’t like it, there’s the door,’ and she _left_. I never thought she actually _would_.”

“Oh,” Brian says, which seems to set her off again. She collapses against his shoulder, still crying, and Brian spends a brief moment wondering if he’s actually in hell and no one told him.

A change of subject seems like a good idea, but he can’t think of any. Brian puts on his supportive face. “What were you fighting about?”

Mel takes a minute or so to sit up. She wipes her eyes. “Nothing, really. I don’t know. We’re hosting this dinner with some of her friends, and I made a joke about what she’s making, and she snapped at me, and it just … went from there.”

Brian can’t not ask. “Was it that stupid rolled up meat thing with too many herbs?”

Mel actually laughs, albeit with a slightly watery undertone. “How’d you guess?”

Brian shrugs, extracts a joint from his pocket, lights it, drags on it, offers it to her. Mel takes it.

They sit in not-uncomfortable silence for a few more moments.

Then, for fuck knows what reason, Brian decides to say, “You know, Justin always saw you two as the perfect relationship. The ideal.”

Mel laughs, not really humorous. “He wasn’t the only one.” She sucks on the joint, studies it, and hands it back. “Jesus. It’s all just so _pointless_. The same fight, over and over again.”

She settles back on the couch and looks up at the ceiling again. “Did you ever think you’d have a more successful relationship than Lindsay?”

Brian laughs. “Early on? Fuck no.”

“And later?”

He blows a long thin stream of smoke up at a diagonal, not looking at her. “Tell anyone I said this and I’ll make your life miserable.”

Curious and really starting to feel the weed now, Mel nods. 

“Most of the gospel on relationships is bullshit,” Brian says, a lot of distance in his face. “All you need is communication, a lack of secrets, some common beliefs, and mutual respect.”

“That’s rich, coming from Mr. Dysfunctional Sex Addict.”

Brian laughs again, coldly, Mel thinks at her. “Casual sex is a hobby for me. Nothing more and nothing less. If you don’t like hammering, don’t marry a woodworking enthusiast. Nobody gets that, about me. But Justin does.”

He takes a deep inhale off the joint, pulls the smoke back into his mouth. “About half the time, Justin wants to cared for, listened to, held, adored, and the other half you just need to leave him the fuck alone so he can do his own thing. He needs someone who knows without being told which one to do at any given time. And I know, I’ve known since I pulled my head out of my ass when it comes to him. And he-” He curls his lip, at himself, seemingly. “He understands me. He doesn’t try to change me. He knows what I am, and he helps me filter out the bad shit when it comes along.”

Brian turns to look at her. “So what do you and Lindsay give each other? Because right now it looks like either a whole lot of nothing or a bitch of a headache.”

Mel bristles. “Fuck you. We- we’ve been together _forever_! We’ve gone through so much already that-”

She breaks off, and Brian gives her, shockingly enough, a genuine smile, if a sad one. “That you can’t give up now?”

Suddenly, Mel doesn’t want to look at him.

“Ever heard of the sunk-cost fallacy?” Brian says, in a horrifically friendly voice.

“An opportunity like that and not one phallus joke? You really are getting old.”

Brian snorts a short unpleasant laugh. “You’re talking to the king of misdirection. That shit won’t fly here. So have you heard-”

Mel grits her teeth. “Yes,” she says, “I’ve heard of the fucking sunk-cost fallacy.”

“Great,” Brian says. “Feel like applying it to the current situation?”

“We’re- I’m not going to _break up with Lindsay_ ,” Mel says, glaring. “Over what, a tiny argument?”

“How about years of them?”

“That’s-” Mel says, and stops. “Fuck you. Talk all you want, you still have no idea what a real relationship is made of.”

“Oooooooh,” Brian says, grinning dangerously at her, nowhere close to a smile. “I know- registry at Nordstrom’s, sex on Saturday mornings and fights on Tuesday night, emotional emptiness despite all those nice safe locked doors, the all-exalted _monogamy_?”

Mel takes a long slug off the scotch bottle, now well on its way to empty, and slams it down. “You have _no right-_ ” she says, voice shaking with anger.

“I have _every_ fucking right,” Brian says, matching her livid glare. “Because one day my kid is going to get here, and I’d really rather he not have to watch his mothers tear each other apart on a daily basis!”

Mel stands up and points at him. Brian lazes back on the couch, affecting boredom. “You wanted us _together_ for Gus,” she snaps. “Not apart.”

Brian laughs again, even colder this time. “Yeah, about half a century ago, when we were all even more stupid than we were young.”

She looks like she’s going to say something else, but instead she turns on her heel and heads for the door. For the second time that day, Brian speaks without thinking. 

“Think about it,” he says. “Do you really want to be feeling like this for the rest of eternity? And I don’t mean figuratively, in case you forgot.”

Mel keeps walking, but slows as she reaches the door. She stops, shoulders down. It’s another minute or so before she turns and comes back to the couch.

“Fuck,” she says.

Brian hands her the bottle. “That might be the first intelligent thing you’ve said all day.”

***

“What,” Mel says, for the fourth time, “am I supposed to do now?”

Brian shrugs. Brian is on the floor now, smoking and contemplating the ceiling. Brian feels pretty good, all things considered. 

“Don’t know why you’re asking me,” he says, finally, “the supposed failure at relationships.”

Mel groans. “Fine. You are a very competent participant in a loving long-term partnership.”

Brian snorts. “Christ. You make it sound like something to put on my resume.”

“Do you miss Justin?” Mel says, then, out of nowhere.

Brian looks over at her. “The fuck do you think?”

“I-” Mel says, and closes her mouth. “I wasn’t-”

“I wake up every single goddamn morning and wonder if today’s the day, and then I hate myself for it because that means I’m hoping for his death,” Brian says, letting the words burn his mouth like whiskey, forbidden thoughts falling out unexpected. “I love him and I’m content to wait for him, but I miss him in a way that shouldn’t be possible to feel.”

“Oh,” Mel says. Brian looks back up at the lighting fixtures and tries to regain the happier side of his high.

“Did- did Lindsay miss me like that?” she says after a little while.

 _Nobody misses anybody like this_ , Brian thinks, but even his current crossfaded state can’t make him feel like saying that one out loud. “She missed you,” he says. “She talked about it a lot. About you.”

“I missed her too,” Mel says. “I try to think about that when I’m angry at her, about how I would have given anything to see her again before I knew we’d end up ... here.”

“And how often do you have to do that?”

Mel sighs. “About three times a week.”

Brian raises his eyebrows. “And you’ve been here how long now?”

She drinks before answering. “Seven months.”

“Huh,” Brian says, frowning slightly. Mel waits for more, but he doesn’t talk.

“Say it,” she says. He smiles at the ceiling.

“I was just thinking that it’ll be a miracle if Justin and I make it out of bed three times a week by the time he’s been here seven months.”

Mel rolls her eyes. “So you’re a sex addict, what else is new?”

Laughing softly, definitely at her, Brian gestures vaguely with the joint. “None of you assholes get it. Sex with me and Justin, it’s - the first way we learned to communicate, it’s our favorite way to spend time together after we’ve been apart. It’s not _just_ sex. Just sex is what you do with strangers in clubs or tricks you take home. It’s not- the same activity, even.”

He pauses, looks at her. “You don’t understand that, probably. Not that it’s any of your business. And anyway, we’re talking about you.”

“That’s a sentence I never expected to hear you say,” Mel says. He looks at her expectantly, not even bothering to come up with a responding barb.

“So,” she says, after slightly too long a silence, “you think I should break up with her.”

“I didn’t say that.”

“You didn’t _not_ say it.”

“I also didn’t not say you should become an Elvis impersonator, but I don’t see you shopping for sequin jumpsuits.”

“Fuck you.”

 _This is going well_ , Brian thinks. He can practically hear Justin snickering at him from beyond the great divide.

 _If you’re so smart, what would you do?_ he says to the Justin in his head.

Justin laughs, a terrible clench around his chest. _Just_ talk _to her, asshole_.

_What do you think I’m doing, Sunshine, telepathy?_

_I mean being supportive. A friend._

_Jesus_ , Brian thinks. _I know you’re an idealist, but that’s a stretch even for you._

_Stranger things have happened._

_Such as?_

Justin’s giving him the sly amused smile now, the one that can make him rock-hard from across a room. _Brian Kinney falling in love with a trick who wouldn’t go away?_

_You were- special, though._

_Correct_ , Justin says, smirking. _But if you make an effort, maybe you’ll get a nice dream blowjob tonight._

Brian smiles despite himself. _Sunshine, if you could guarantee that, I’d be an honest-to-God humanitarian._

 _Now that I’d like to see_. He smiles again, sweet and open this time. _She needs your help, so get on with it. ___

_I love you_ , Brian thinks. 

_I know. Now quit stalling._

Justin’s still smiling as his face fades from Brians mind.

Brian hauls himself into roughly a sitting position on the floor. “Okay,” he says. “What about a trial separation? Six months, a year, something like that. With a deadline. If you hate it after that much time, you’ll know that much more about how hard to fight.”

Mel huffs. “That just seems so- serious.”

“And having constant fights with the so-called love of your life isn’t?”

“Couples fight. You and Justin fought all the time.”

Brian smiles fondly. Not for Mel. “Justin and I bickered. For fun. Sex during arguments is hot as hell.”

“Jesus.”

“You asked.”

“I didn’t, but- what I’m saying is, this isn’t grounds for such a big step.”

“Yeah?” Brian says. “Because I do talk to your wife too, you know, and she doesn’t seem to think things are going that great either.”

Mel glares. “Why do you even care?” 

For a moment, Justin flashes against the front of his mind, wearing an expectant smile. “No fucking clue. But I do, and I’ve been told I’m very persistent, so you’d better figure _something_ out.”

“You don’t even like me.”

“Not offering myself up as a replacement spouse, if that’s what you’re thinking.”

Mel doesn’t say anything to that, and they sit in silence for a few minutes. Then she sits up, an unpleasant smile on her face. Brian is pleased at his forethought in getting so wasted that he’s not now nervous.

“So,” she says, “you think I have a problem. And I think you have a problem. What if we each did our own little separation?”

Brian frowns. “What the fuck are you talking about?”

“I do the separation from Lindsay, and you take a year off from casual sex. As in, all casual sex.”

Brian feels genuinely taken aback, and shows it, for a fragment of a second, before his attitude snaps back into place.

He smiles pleasantly at Mel, internally cursing himself for how far he’ll go to get to checkmate.

“That’s an interesting proposition,” he says. “Out of curiosity, why the fuck should I have to suffer just because you’re having relationship troubles?”

“Who knows,” Mel says. “But if I have to do this shit, so do you.”

“Not an equal exchange,” Brian says. 

“I don’t care,” Mel says. “You want us to do this? You give your dick a break for once in your life.”

Brian rolls his eyes. 

_Holy shit, you’re actually considering this?_ Justin, bounding obnoxiously back into his thoughts.

 _No_.

 _Sure looks like you are_.

_Would you shut the fuck up?_

_Not in my list of skills, sorry._

_I am_ not, Brian thinks, _considering it._

 _Uh-huh_.

_Why should I give up something I enjoy for basically nothing in return?_

_Maybe you’re curious to see what it’s actually like to go without sex._

_Why would I be?_

_Maybe you’d like to spend a year pining for me, locked in a fairytale tower, meditating on how much you miss my presence in every facet of your existence._

_Fuck off_.

_That’s no way to talk to the undying love of your life. And death, apparently._

_Christ, I love you. But fuck off._

_Better._

_I try_.

 _Maybe,_ Justin says, _you’re considering doing this because it’s something real you can do for Gus._

Brian closes his eyes, breathes in, breathes out. _Maybe._

_How hard could it be, anyway?_

_Very hard, as-_

_-I damn well know, yeah, yeah, yeah. You know what I mean, asshole._

Brian pinches the bridge of his nose. “Okay,” he says out loud.

Mel stares at him. “What?”

“Okay,” Brian says, “I’ll do it if you will.” _Checkmate_ , he thinks. _And you’d better make that a month of dream blowjobs, Sunshine._

 _I’ll see what I can do_.

***

“You WHAT?” Lindsay screeches at him the next morning. Brian winces, head ringing.

“Clearly things aren’t working the way they are,” he says, speaking softly in the hopes of coaxing her to do the same.

It doesn’t work.

“You- you’re such a _shit_!” Lindsay yells. “Where the hell do you get off-”

“Nowhere, for the next three hundred and sixty-four days,” Brian says.

 _Just couldn’t resist, could you?_

_You know me so well._

She fumes at him for ten more minutes on the same general subject. Brian stands there calmly for most of it. Lindsay slams the door when she leaves.

_That went well._

_You think it could have gone any other way?_

_I could have spun her to my side._

_Well, we can’t all have your big innocent eyes and endearing short stature._

_Fuck you._

_I wish you could._

Brian walks gingerly to the coffeemaker and tops up his mug.

 _By the way,_ he thinks, _why the fuck didn’t you stop me from agreeing to the stupidest bet of all time?_

_Technically, I don’t think it’s a bet. Also, in case you forgot, I’m coming from inside your head, so in terms of bad decisions, what’s mine is yours._

Draining the mug, Brian glares at the ocean out the window. _Okay. So I’m going to go talk to Mel, tell her that I’m not doing this bullshit celibate year or whateverthefuck just so she and Linds can have, what, a new lease on life?_

 _Hmm,_ Justin says. _Thought you agreed so that Gus won’t arrive to a pair of bitterly miserable parents._

_What about a surprise divorce? Welcome to the afterlife, sonnyboy, sorry to say your moms just don’t love each other any more. Jesus, why couldn’t they just get their shit together?_

The Justin in his mind doesn’t respond. 

_God, I wish you were here for real,_ Brian thinks. _Sorry._

 _Don’t be,_ Justin says, and Brian can almost feel him, taste him, a soft caress against his cheek, Justin stroking his shoulders, folding himself against his chest. _I wish I could be there too._

***

He doesn’t see Mel for another two days. Then he runs into her in, of all places, the produce section of the local grocery store.

She comes up beside him as he’s shaking water off a bunch of kale. 

“I’m moving out,” she says.

Brian tries to remain expressionless. “Where?”

“I got an apartment. Cool little place. Lindsay and I talked it over, and- we think it may be a good idea. This thing.”

“Huh,” Brian says. 

“I also wanted to say- thanks. For listening.”

Brian shrugs.

“Also,” Mel says, “don’t think I’m not expecting you to keep up your end of the bargain.”

“Fuck you,” Brian says, almost absently.

“That’d break your agreement,” Mel says, dropping a frozen chicken pot pie into his cart. “By the way, since you won’t have to maintain the perfect body for the near future, why don’t you eat some actual food once in a while?”

Brian flips her off, but she’s already walking away. He almost tosses the pie on principle, but it’s organic and there’s nothing in the fridge at home but poppers and an underripe mango, so he leaves it in the cart.

 _My, my,_ Justin says. _This_ is _an interesting development._

_Do you just fucking live in my head now?_

_You tell me. Not real, remember?_

_Maybe I’m going crazy,_ Brian thinks. _It’d explain all the weird shit I’ve agreed to lately._

 _I don’t think you really “agreed” to watch_ Hello, Dolly! _with Deb. I counted three physical threats._

***

Michael thinks it’s the most hilarious development in the history of the universe.

“ _Celibate?_ ” he wheezes. Again. 

“Yes,” Brian says, gritting his teeth. “Celibate. Not something I ever _wanted_ to do, but it’s not like she gave me much choice.”

“You could have just lived and let live. Not indulged your maladjusted desire to exercise control over every aspect of your friends’ lives.”

 _Ooooooh,_ Justin says. _Mikey got a bullseye._

Brian bites his cheek before he responds. “I know what it’s like to have parents who hate each other and won’t admit it. It’s better to have it out in the open for Gus. And J.R.”

Michael raises his eyebrows, somewhat uncharitably, Brian thinks ( _Really?_ Justin says. _I’d call it downright generous._ ).

“You really have grown up, haven’t you?” he says.

“Would everyone stop saying that?” Brian says back, no real fire in it. Mikey barely registers it, just changes the subject to some boring shit about Ben and books, and Brian settles back and doesn’t think about the thing he can’t stop thinking about.

Even Lindsay comes around, eventually.

“You were right,” she says as they’re sitting together by the beach one day, the first time she’s spoken to him in two weeks. “We weren’t happy.”

Brian shrugs. “Sorry.”

Lindsay looks at him. “Mel told me that- you want this for the kids. For us to find some conclusion.”

“Yeah,” Brian says.

“And I’ve started to think-” Lindsay says, “that maybe we are better off as friends. It wouldn’t be the worst thing in the world to try dating again. Meet a new girlfriend.”

“Or boyfriend,” Brian says, not looking at her.

“Or that,” Lindsay says. “Yeah.”

The most surprising thing is how well it goes, at least initially. Brian’s gone weeks - well, week - without club sex in the past when work shit had piled up too high, longer, once or twice, when he was with Justin, and so the first two months pass relatively easily, plenty of morning runs and afternoon jerk-offs clearing the way.

Brian doesn’t watch porn, not like Ted used to, anyway, has always considered it overdone, lame, too far removed from his favorite parts of the action. But now his guilty pleasure, minus the “guilty”, is dirty memories, projected up on a stunningly high-definition screen, every sound and feeling there for him to experience again. 

It’s- not comfortable, at all, he still can’t push off the urge to track down every hot guy who cruises him on the street, but it’s almost okay. Brian likes a challenge, likes competition, so he sets himself the goal of being a grand master at handjobs by the end of the year, another tick on his list of sex triumphs to show off at the clubs.

 _That’s possibly the most pathetic thing you’ve ever thought,_ Justin says. _Which, no offense, is saying something._

Brian elects not to respond to that, pulling up the window that shows the real Justin’s life on earth instead. He’s been doing these little check-ins more often than usual in the past weeks, has needed it more, without the distraction of his second-favorite pastime. Today, Justin’s at the condo, taking a shower. Brian watches his familiar motions, shaking water off his head and then blinking when it goes in his eyes, droplets sliding down the curves and planes of his body.

Brian backs up to sit on the couch, unbuttoning his jeans as he does it. _Fuck, you’re so hot. Mind if I-_

 _God no,_ Justin says with a little knowing smirk. _Go right ahead._

***

Of course, five months in it all goes to shit.

Mel comes over - she’s been doing that more lately, and Brian is pointedly remaining annoyed about it - looking almost guilty. He frowns. “What-”

Mel scrubs a hand over her face. “We-” she says, and stops.

“Gonna need a little more than that.”

Mel looks at each of the walls, the ceiling, the floor. Brian raises an expectant eyebrow.

“If you’re just going to sit there-”

“I slept with Lindsay,” Mel says.

Brian doesn’t say anything.

“We didn’t mean for it to happen,” she continues, “it just- did. And now everything’s so much more complicated, and I _miss_ her, but- I mean, you know it had been going well, to be honest, getting a little distance from each other, and I don’t know-”

Brian’s silent for a minute or more. Then he laughs, a high-pitched, terrifying laugh.

“You hypocritical _cunt_ ,” he says, face going dark and threatening. Mel recoils. “You tell me _I_ have a problem, and then can’t even keep up with your end of the agreement? And you come to me hoping for, what, a hug and a kiss and assurance that it’ll all be okay?”

Mel glares, maybe starting to cry. “You fucking-” she hisses. “As much as I’ve wished that it not be the case in the past, we are _family_. I talk to you because despite all your attempts to hide it, you give a shit, and because I am your son’s mother, and because I know that you won’t tear Lindsay down just to make me feel better. You’re an asshole, Brian, but at least you’re honest, and I thought we had-”

Brian sneers. “ _Something?_ A _bond_ , like we’re in our own little rom-com?”

“Mutual respect, maybe,” Mel says. “But as usual when it comes to you, my expectations were too high.”

Brian downs half a bottle of whiskey after she’s stormed out, pacing the edge of the living room. He waits for Justin to come snap him out of it, but Justin isn’t there.

***

His return to the Inferno back room is treated with a degree of reverence that he’d be very pleased with if he wasn’t too drunk to focus on more than one thing at a time. Right now, that thing is the hunky young rockstar type he’d magnetized off the dance floor without even trying, who’s currently slobbering up the side of his neck. 

“No kissing,” Brian tells the guy, and pushes him up against the wall. It’s so easy to get back into the rhythm, rub, stroke, rinse, repeat. 

_What the fuck do you think you’re doing?_

In the dark, Brian can glare without anyone noticing. _None of your business._

Justin’s got that determined set to his jaw today, clear light eyes peeling him disturbingly bare. _Bullshit. You don’t want to do this and you know it._

Belts off. Flies unzipped. Brian turns his new friend around, face to wall.

_If you care so much, where the fuck were you this afternoon?_

He bites the top off a condom, rolls it on.

 _You tell me,_ Justin says. _I’m not actually here, remember?_

Brian stops, ignoring the trick’s questioning look. _Yeah,_ he thinks, furious. _You’re not. And I would give fucking ANYTHING to have you with me right now, and they- they_ HAVE _each other, and they can’t even make it WORK!_

 _Oh,_ Justin says, startled, cruelly gentle. _Brian, baby._ Brian can just see his face, concerned and soft, feel warm hands grounding him.

_Don’t fucking patronize me._

Justin doesn’t even seem to register that. _I love you,_ he murmurs. _I love you so much, and I’ll be there before you know it._

Brian closes his eyes, breathes in, very nearly manages to imagine that Justin is right there for him to inhale.

“Sorry,” he tells his confused conquest. “Gotta run.”

Debbie’s at the house when he gets back.

She hands him a plate of tuna macaroni casserole, no room for objection. “Mel came to see me,” she says.

Brian sighs and eats a forkful of pasta. “Oh,” he says. 

“I’m not here to chew you out,” Debbie says. “I know you well enough to know you’ve already done that yourself.”

Brian smiles wryly. “Okay.”

“I do think you should apologize to her, and you’re an inconsiderate shit at things like this, so I have the number of a very nice florist for you to order her an I’m-sorry surprise.”

Brian rolls his eyes. “Seriously?”

 _That_ is _a stretch, Deb, I have to say_ , Justin says. Brian tried not to smile.

“Seriously,” Deb says. “And you’ll do it because if you don’t, I won’t teach you the thing I’m here to teach you, and believe me, you don’t want to miss out on that.”

***

It works best alone, Deb says, so once she’s walked him through the basics and extracted a promise that yes, he will send Mel some damn flowers, she hugs him, tells him she’s proud of the man he’s become, and leaves. Brian considers getting shitfaced in order to avoid the feelings that brings up, but it might not work if he’s drunk and there’s something he needs more right now than not to be able to feel.

He goes to the bedroom and lies down - it takes a lot of energy, Deb had said, best not to be standing up - and closes his eyes. He pictures Justin’s face, lets himself be covered in the pure helpless love he feels for him, how much he wants to be near him, focuses on that feeling until he’s barely aware of anything in his immediate environment.

Brian opens his eyes, and he’s in Manhattan, the condo, and Justin is lying peacefully asleep next to him. Brian nearly gasps, because he can feel the warmth emanating from Justin’s body, can smell him, the clean soft comfortable smell that makes him feel more at home than anything ever has.

He reaches out to touch him, but of course his hand goes right through. _You can’t affect the world like this,_ Deb had said, _but you can spend a little time there, once in a while, when you need to._

Brian nestles as close as he can to Justin’s sleeping body, breathes deep, eyes closed.

 _Love me?_ he thinks, not caring about being sad or pathetic or any of that bullshit, because he hasn’t felt this safe and calm in years.

The Justin in his head is smiling at him, adoring. _Always._

***

“So,” Lindsay says, as he opens the door exactly one year from the day he did the same thing to find Mel bearing tears and liquor. “I think we’re going to break up.”

Her voice cracks a little on the end of the sentence, and Brian surprises himself by pulling her into a hug. She cries for a little, there on the doorstep, and he leads her down to the kitchen island and its waiting coffeepot.

“You gonna keep the house?” he says.

“I think so,” Lindsay says. He hands her a mug. “Mel likes her apartment, she wants to keep living there.”

“And you two- you’re okay?”

“Not yet,” Lindsay says. “But we’ll be able to be friends. I’d miss her too much if we weren’t.” 

Brian nods. “Good. That’s- good.”

Lindsay sits on one of the barstools. “What about you? Are you okay?”

“Just great,” Brian says. “I get to have sex again, what more could I ask for?”

Lindsay looks at him. He knows what she’s going to say.

“I heard...” she says. “I heard Justin’s dating someone. A sculptor.”

“Yeah,” Brian says.

“Are you okay?”

“He’s happy,” Brian says. No need to hesitate. “And I’m happy for him.”

Lindsay doesn’t look like she believes him, but he doesn’t need her to.

After she leaves, Brian hits the clubs. It’s the middle of the day, so pickings are slim, but he’s lowered his standards significantly ( _as if you ever had any_ , Justin says) and he quickly finds an adequate muscular brunette dying for a dick up his ass.

 _I love you,_ he thinks, as he’s preparing to start his pursuit. _But would you mind holding off on the snarky comments while I fuck this guy?_

 _Your wish is my command,_ Justin says, laughing, affectionately mocking. _Go get him, tiger._

***

He tells Justin, the real Justin, about it in the first week he’s there. It’s not completely intentional - they’re entangled in a pile of blankets on the bedroom floor, drenched in delirious afterglow, and Brian is stroking Justin’s warm flank and kissing his hair and thinking that this might be the happiest moment of his existence, and he makes a passing comment about being glad he hadn’t had to give up sex permanently, forgetting for a second that Justin wasn’t actually there for any of it, and then of course he has to explain it all, the ludicrous deal he’d made before Mel and Lindsay got divorced.

“Wow,” Justin says, when he’s finished explaining. He looks like he’s trying not to laugh. “A whole year without sex. What was that like?”

 _Better with you._ “Boring,” Brian says out loud. “Depressing.”

“No plans to join the priesthood?”

“Nope,” Brian says, popping the “p”, staring at Justin’s mouth and wondering how many more times he’ll be able to get it up today.

“Bet you’re even better at handjobs now,” Justin says thoughtfully, and Brian loves him so much it makes him want to actually vocalize the desire to kiss him senseless and fall asleep in his arms and do stupid couple-y things in public.

“But seriously,” Justin says, wiggling tantalizingly under him and smirking in a way that indicates he’s not being even a little serious, “any ongoing interest in giving up sex?”

“Fuck no,” Brian says, and dives to swallow Justin’s laugh before it even really starts.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> My first controversial plot point, perhaps - not where I was expecting this chapter concept to go, but sometimes you just gotta let the muses drive. I’ve also edited chapter 3 to fix the single continuity error caused by the development, because unlike soap opera writers in the 2000s, apparently, I am deeply irked by plot misalignments and will use all the power available to me to correct them.


	21. Chapter 21

Four out of every five nights they go out, Brian’s on full stud alert and winds up hunting down at least one overconfident admirer who’ll be squealing his way to bottomhood in fifteen minutes or less. Justin takes the floor while he does it, generally, finds a cute guy to dance with and occasionally to hook up with as well, or wanders the crisscrossing network of skywalks catching up with friends. It’s a good system. It works for them.

But tonight Brian won’t be bothering with any of the plentiful suitors making Bambi eyes at him. Tonight, Justin can already tell, is going to be one of those nights where Brian glues himself to Justin’s body like a large sexily-dressed limpet and stares at him with greed and awe whenever he’s not trying to eat him alive. 

Justin likes to think of himself as a good person, moral, for the most part, but he can’t deny the vicious pleasure he takes in knowing that Brian is his like this, that he is the only person who has ever made Brian feel this enormous all-encompassing love, that no one else will ever get a second fuck or a second dance or a first kiss with him.

“I,” Brian moan-whispers behind him, licking over his jaw, “am going to make you come. Mmmm. Over and over and over again, got it?”

Justin grins and leans back against Brian, and is immediately treated to the sensation of a stiff clothed cock grinding against his ass. “You are _so_ high,” he says.

Brian turns him so they’re face-to-face, wraps his arms around him and rubs their faces together. “And you are _so_ hot.” He kisses Justin before he’s even really finished the sentence, still rubbing up against him. Justin laughs, and Brian licks down his throat.

“Want to take this party back there?” Justin says, looking vaguely in the direction of the nearest sex-permitting area while Brian chews on his neck. The bathroom, he thinks. Normally he doesn’t do getting fucked in the stalls, too cramped, undignified, but even after this much time, Justin will drop all his standards embarrassingly quickly for Brian in a handsy mood.

Brian shakes his head, now nibbling at the hinge of Justin’s jaw. “Not tonight,” he murmurs, wrapping himself even closer around Justin. “Let’s- go home, okay?” 

Justin smiles at him, his beautiful open face, and wonders if it’s a bad thing that there is absolutely nothing he wouldn’t agree to when Brian speaks in that soft vulnerable voice. 

“Yeah,” Justin says. “Let’s go home.”

Brian’s all over him on the bus back, kissing him filthily and rubbing his hands up under Justin’s shirt. The only other people on the bus are three neon-covered ravegoers and the bored-looking driver, so Justin doesn’t even bother trying to get it down to an acceptable level of PDA, just lets Brian practically get the evening’s foreplay done on the carpeted hard-backed seats. 

They stumble into the house laughing, arms around each other. Brian kicks the door closed and shoves Justin up against the wall, starts opening his pants and panting into his neck. Justin laughs and strokes his back, and Brian presses him hard against the wall and kisses him on the mouth before falling to his knees and swallowing his cock whole. 

“Jesus,” Justin breathes, unable to stop staring at Brian sucking him ravenously, growling out little hungry sounds. Justin threads a hand into Brian’s hair and pushes, lightly. Brian moans and shoves his head down on his cock, so Justin starts to really use his mouth, fucking a little harder on each push into Brian’s throat. It’s dirty and amazing, the kind of thing he’s used to in the dingier areas of their favorite bars, almost out of place in the entryway to their comfortably elegant living room. Justin’s getting close, now, so he murmurs debauched praise down at Brian, spurring him on, barely even managing to warn him just before he comes, deliciously heavy and liquid, Brian sucking him through it until he has to plead for a break.

“Mmmmm,” Brian says, coming up to kiss him lazily. “You taste fucking amazing.” Justin, brain not insignificantly fried, doesn’t have an immediate response, not that he could have given one anyway with the way Brian’s currently attached to his mouth.

“Fuck,” Brian murmurs. He pulls Justin’s shirt over his head, kisses across his collarbones. “Good?”

Justin nods, smiling hazily. “Yeah.”

Brian grins and pulls him off the wall into a deep possessive kiss, walking them down towards the sofa. “Good.”

An hour or two later, they’re lying in bed, pleasantly worn out, just kissing, not really starting anything. It’s dark outside, well past midnight, and they’re illuminated only in the moonlight shimmering off the ocean through the windows.

Brian’s holding Justin’s head steady for his mouth when he feels wetness under his thumb. When he lifts his head, he realizes that Justin’s crying.

“Hey,” Brian murmurs, kissing softly down the tear track on Justin’s right cheek. “You okay?”

Justin smiles at him, a real smile, and Brian relaxes. “I’m fine,” he says, bumping their foreheads together. “Better than fine. I’m just- it hits me, once in a while. That we’re here.”

Brian nuzzles into the soft fine hair right above his ear. “Yeah?”

Justin nods. “I _mourned_ you, for _years_ , and the idea that we can be together again, that this is real, sometimes it’s- a little much. That’s all.”

“I know the feeling,” Brian says, and pulls him in even closer, cradles Justin’s precious warm living body to himself. Justin smiles up at him, soft in the dim light rising off the sea.

***

Justin wakes up the next morning to the smell of fresh coffee. He’s sitting up, just starting to consider leaving the bed, when Brian bounds in with a tray and an unsettlingly cheerful grin.

“Morning,” he says, dropping a quick kiss on Justin’s temple before sitting down next to him, resting the tray across their laps. “Want coffee?”

Justin frowns at the contents of the tray - mugs, juice, fruit, eggs - and then at Brian. “Uh-”

“I decided to take the day off,” Brian says. “Thought we could spend some time together.”

“Okay...” Justin says, trying not to look like he’s scanning the eggs for signs of shell pieces.

Brian laughs at him. “I got them all out. I think.” He rests his mouth against Justin’s cheek, wraps himself closer around him. Predictably, Justin doesn’t let the food go to waste, so Brian just sips his coffee and feels the solid warm presence of Justin next to him. 

“What are you working on today?” Brian asks, twining around him as he tries to get dressed. “Nothing in particular,” Justin says. 

Brian kisses his neck. “Want to go for a walk on the beach?”

Justin looks at him. “Want to tell me why you’ve turned into a manic pixie dream girl?”

Brian frowns. “The fuck’s that?”

Justin laughs, then, kissing him, quick, on the mouth before pulling a shirt over his head. “Never mind.” He pauses. “Why are you- you’ve never been the breakfast in bed type.”

Brian slides his arms around him, grinning. “People change, or haven’t you heard?”

Justin can’t help but smile and kiss him again. “I guess not.”

It’s a stormy grey day, but there’s no rain, not yet, anyway. The water’s at low tide, so they walk hand in hand down the packed damp part of the beach.

“So what inspired- this?” Justin says.

Brian kisses him. “You were right, you know,” he says. “It’s- a miracle, what we have. I realized we hadn’t spent a whole day just being together since we were in Elyrium, so-”

Justin smiles at him. “You’re aware that this is all disgustingly romantic, right?”

Brian smiles and presses his lips to his cheek. “Would it feel right any other way?”


	22. Chapter 22

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> I realized recently that with all the soapy drama, I haven’t written much of the boys in their actual normal lives. So, here’s a chapter that’s just about a regular day in paradise.

Loving Brian Kinney has many unusual benefits, Justin thinks, but perhaps the most useful is his total lack of aversion to multitasking in practically any situation.

“I forgot- to tell you-” Justin says, brokenly, because Brian has him on his hands and knees on the living room carpet and he’s pounding him like it’s his personal mission to make him squirm every time he sits down for the rest of the day, “that tailor downtown, they - ohgodohgodohgodohgod, right there, _Brian_ , please - called yesterday, they’re sending _ohfuckingmotherof_ someone to the office this morning.”

Brian bites at his shoulder, groans long and low as he keeps on thrusting. “Thanks,” he grunts. “Before ten?”

“I think - fuckohfuckfuckmeharderyesohmy - so,” Justin says. “It’s, holy _shit_ , your _cock_ , on the message.” It’s eight o’clock in the fucking morning and he’s being railed within an inch of his life on the carpet in front of the windows overlooking the obscenely beautiful view from their perfect gorgeous home and Justin has never felt more satisfied, at peace, anything.

“Okay,” Brian says, grabbing at his hips to fuck him harder. “I’ll, _unngh_ , check to make _aaaaah_ sure.”

Spousal duties now dispatched, Justin devotes himself entirely to enjoying the spectacular sex he’s being made privy to. Brian is plowing him open shamelessly, grabbing his body with greedy hands, kissing along his shoulderblades, and it feels like victory, like standing up to something. “ _Fuck_ me,” he growls, and Brian doubles his efforts, slamming him forward on the rug, kissing him on the mouth with a tongue that slides all over his face, hands on his shoulders, giving ruthless pleasure even as he nuzzles his jaw with hungry tenderness.

Justin groans, happy and delirious. “Shit, I’m- _yes_ ,” he moans, pushing his hips up, trying to find _that_ angle. Brian laughs dark and knowing, and then he’s pulling out, not without much profane protest, flipping Justin over and ramming right back in as if he’d never stopped. It’s _there_ , _right there_ , and Justin is no longer capable of words, not that he really needs them. Brian leans down on top of him, folding him in half, and kisses him so hard it’s like being fucked twice at a time, and Justin comes like that, rubbing off against Brian’s stomach without even having to try. Brian grins against his mouth, just a little too pleased with himself, and Justin would be thoughtful about that if he wasn’t currently being torn to shreds by a ridiculously good orgasm under the floor lamp before he’s even had coffee.

Feeling more than a little druggy, Justin strokes Brian’s back, smiles dizzily up at him as his movements get more erratic. “Fuck-” Brian says, clawing at him. “You’re- I-”

Justin reaches up to caress his face, absurdly soft in the middle of their debauchery, and Brian shudders and comes, cursing, kissing him frantically, breathing him in like air.

Brian flops down onto his chest, panting. Justin laughs and pokes him.

“We gotta get up.”

“No,” Brian says.

“We have to shower.”

“Don’t want to.”

“You have the meeting with the designer people.”

“Fuck ’em.”

Justin smiles up at the ceiling, ruffling Brian’s sweaty damp hair. Then he rolls over in a smooth practiced motion, dumping Brian unceremoniously onto the floor.

He stands up. Brian looks pitifully at him.

“Don’t you want to stay here and _cuddle?_ ” he says. Justin thinks it’s only about forty percent facetious.

He grins. “Fuck you, get up.”

Brian flips him off behind his back before hauling himself to his feet and following Justin to the shower.

***

Justin makes breakfast while Brian does his seventeen-step skincare routine. (He’s exaggerating on the number slightly. He thinks.) They eat in towels at the kitchen island, interrupted only by the unplanned arrival of the tuxedo cat, who answers Brian’s glare with a _prrrrrp?_ and then pads to the sofa, curls into a doughnut, and promptly falls asleep.

“I thought I’d stopped them coming in,” Brian says, still frowning vaguely at the sofa.

“Clearly,” Justin says, hiding his smile behind his mug.

As they’re getting dressed, Justin says, “Mind if I tag along to the office today?”

Brian looks at him. “Yeah, why?”

Justin shrugs. “No portrait appointments today, and I need inspiration.”

“From ... my office?”

Justin pecks him on the cheek. “From you in a sexy suit. So choose a good one.”

Brian grins, considers a range of comebacks about how he owns no bad suits, rejects them as uncreative. He unhooks a black silk Versace, narrow lapels, and holds it up. “Does this suit your vision, your highness?”

Justin rolls his eyes, smiling. “With the Gucci belt with the big buckle, you know the one.” 

“The boy has expensive tastes,” Brian says, smirking, which is so absurd that Justin doesn’t even bother with a response.

Brian jogs into the kitchen ten minutes later in the chosen outfit, briefcase in hand, as Justin’s packing up his tablet and sketchpad. “Ready to go?”

“Fuck,” Justin says, giving him a once-over and letting his bored horny brain take over from his self-respect. “I want you to _end_ me.” Suddenly much less concerned about getting them to work on time, he strokes over the exposed sliver of Brian’s chest under the open collar of his shirt, coiling himself shamelessly around him.

Brian grins at him, predatory. “Behave,” he says, disentangling them, “and after work I’ll do that thing you like with the silk ties and the blindfold.”

Justin moans, only partly for show. “Now I know I’m in heaven,” he breathes, and Brian snickers. “I’m no angel, Sunshine,” he says - predictable, probably, but Justin loves bad sex jokes, so he can’t resist.

***

They get to the office on time, and Justin immediately installs himself on the client couch inside Brian’s office. Most people aren’t there yet, so it’s quiet in the building, a refurbished fabric mill and warehouse. Brian, in typical style, has the whole top floor, a high-ceilinged open space the size of a city block with enormous windows, brick walls, and a polished wooden floor. 

Justin points to the bare back wall. “You should put a mural there.”

Brian looks up from his computer. “I was thinking a big canvas, actually.”

Justin looks at him. “For the last time, we are not going to screw in wet paint and hang it in your office. Or anywhere.”

Brian grins. “Why not?”

“It’s cliché,” Justin says, twirling a stylus. “And messy, and probably not as fun as you think it’d be-”

“Okay, okay,” Brian says, laughing. “We’ll do a mural.”

“ _I’ll_ do a mural,” Justin says. “I need a second project to switch back to when I don’t have portrait work so that I don’t drive myself insane.”

Brian smirks at him. “So my office décor is your therapy now?”

Justin rolls his eyes. “Our therapy is our therapy now. This is just for fun.”

“Hmm,” Brian says, pretending to pore over a sheaf of papers. “Not sure I want to hire an artist with such a laissez-faire attitude to his work.”

Justin snorts and throws a crumpled-up sketch at him. “You won’t be _hiring_ me, and I’ll do it because no one else can execute your ludicrously specific demands.”

There’s a soft chime from the building intercom box on Brian’s desk.

“Tailoring company?” Justin says.

“Probably.”

Justin picks up his bag, walks to the desk, and straightens Brian’s collar. “Break a leg, or whatever.”

“Thanks,” Brian says, grinning, and kisses him. “Get me a caprese on foccacia from Andy’s, would you?”

“I’m not your secretary,” Justin says, smirking back.

“Be hot if you were.”

Justin kisses him on the forehead. “Light on the pesto?”

“God, I love you,” Brian says, and kisses him one more time before pushing him towards the door.

The tailoring rep is the company owner, a World War I soldier who’d died in combat and turned to fashion in the afterlife. Brian had thought, originally, that there was nothing for him in the business world here, with no ultra-powered megacorporations to design for, but it’s been startlingly fantastic to be working with small creative companies again, to be able to pick and choose the interesting clients and have people seeking him out from cities he’s never heard of. They have the beginnings of a contract drawn up by the end of the meeting, and the client leaves with a promise of referrals, so Brian’s feeling good as lunchtime approaches.

Frances shows up at eleven, unannounced, with a young guy he’s never seen before trailing behind her.

“Did I hire you again?” Brian says, only sort of joking.

She laughs. “Not yet.”

Brian frowns. “Then what’s up?”

Frances gestures behind her. “Remember how I asked last Friday if my cousin who’s into graphic design could come look around?”

Brian does not remember, probably because last Friday Brian was experimenting with new and exciting combinations of drugs provided by a chemist friend in Inferno’s underground bar.

“Oh, right,” he says. He looks at the companion, who does in fact have similar features to Frances. “So you must be-”

“-Nico,” the kid says, walking up quickly for a weak handshake. _Twitchy._ “It’s so good to meet you!”

_Peppy, too. Ugh._

“I’ll leave you two to it,” Frances says, smirking. Over Nico’s shoulder, she mouths _also, don’t fuck my cousin_ as she leaves. Brian rolls his eyes.

“You’re like a gay Don Draper,” the kid says, still staring wide-eyed around the office.

Brian grins, wolflike. “Thanks.”

There’s no one available to pawn his new shadow off on, so Brian uses an old exec trick instead. He leads Nico down to the art department’s floor and stations him at a table full of rejected boards.

“These are all shit,” he says. “Fix five of them and you’re hired.”

The kid stares at him. “Seriously?”

“Seriously,” Brian says. “You have two hours.”

***

He comes back to the art floor several long phone calls later to find Justin sketching at the layout table and talking to Nico. 

“So if you just make these lines a little thinner, and line them up like that- hey,” he says, tugging Brian over for a kiss. Brian nips at his mouth when he pulls away, and Justin grins up at him and jumps off the table. 

“Your new acrylics came in, by the way,” he tells him, watching the beautiful sinuous lines of Justin’s ass as he bends to pick up the last of his pencils. 

“At the house?” 

Brian nods. 

“Lunch,” Justin says, handing him a paper bag. “See you later.” He frenches Brian goodbye against the table before striding off.

The kid is watching, open-mouthed. “ _He’s_ your husband? The painter?”

“He’s a lot of things,” Brian says, neatening the storyboards. 

“But he just solved every problem with that layout in, like, five minutes.”

“Yes.”

“And he looks like a Botticelli angel.”

Brian shrugs, a faint smile crossing his mouth. “If you like your balls attached to your body, I’d suggest keeping that observation to yourself.” He pauses and looks at the kid. “Still want the job?”

Nico nods so fast it looks like he’s been glued to a jackhammer. Brian grins scarily at him. “You have ninety minutes left, so get on with it.”

***

Brian gets home to Justin sketching in brown paper rolled out on the long light table in his studio. There’s paint smeared up to his elbows and spattered through his hair, and he’s so beautiful that Brian has to hold the doorframe and stare.

Justin turns, sees him, and beams. _Fuck_ , Brian thinks. Justin snickers.

Brian frowns. “Did I-”

“Say that out loud, yes,” Justin says, smirking. “Come here, I want to show you these drafts.”

The sketches are light, sprawling, detailed with fluid easy pencil strokes and scribbled shading. Streetcorners, storefronts, industrial buildings-

“This is Liberty Avenue,” Brian says, looking at him. “Right?”

Justin nods, smiling, slipping easily in front of him, pulling Brian’s arms around his waist. “You have all that blank space, so I was thinking, why not bring in a little bit of our old homes? We can do New York on one of the side walls, maybe the Cape on the ceiling-”

Brian doesn’t know he’s going to kiss him until his tongue’s already halfway down Justin’s throat, but now he’s wrapped desperately around him, picking him up and setting him on the table, licking in and out of his mouth. “I love you,” he has to say, quiet and a little slurred, right against Justin’s ear, like the first time, and Justin inhales and looks at him and kisses him back so fiercely that Brian’s knees nearly buckle, electricity jumping between them, air in the room crackling.

“God,” Justin says, and nuzzles at him. “Mmmm. Fuck. I-”

“I love you,” Brian says again. “Jesus. Justin. You’re- so- oh, fuck it,” and then they’re on the floor, laughing at each other between hungry moans, tearing at clothes, clutching at skin. 

“Sorry,” Brian says, ten minutes later, as Justin settles back against his bare chest. 

Justin frowns. “For what?”

“I think I promised you some more high-concept sex than that this morning.”

Justin laughs. “Now you’re just fishing for compliments.”

Brian grins and smacks him on the ass for that, but doesn’t deny it. “I _suppose_ the night is still young...”

“Twice in one evening?” Justin says, mock-horrified. “That’s an obscene indulgence for an old married couple like us.”

Brian nips at him, snickering. “Maybe we should have dinner first. Build up our strength.”

“Maybe,” Justin says, and then he’s sliding down Brian’s body, pushing Brian’s legs up onto his shoulders. 

Brian raises an eyebrow.

“You got a question or something?” Justin says, smirking.

Brian rolls his lips back to hold off the smile for just a moment. “Nope,” he says, finally. “Not even one.”


	23. Chapter 23

There’s moonlight pouring out over the ocean when Justin wakes up and Brian’s side of the bed is cold. He sits up, looks around, and slides to his feet, pulling on a pair of sweatpants from the floor as he does.

He pads down the hall, stopping when he sees light leaking out under Brian’s office door. Brian is standing in front of the noteboard, hands in his pockets, and he looks over when the door unlatches.

“What’re you doing up?” he says, as Justin walks up behind him, wraps his arms around his front.

Justin nuzzles him. “I could ask you the same question.”

Brian turns, kisses him on the forehead. “Just couldn’t sleep. I can’t decide on a font.”

“Sounds urgent.”

“You’d be surprised.”

Justin kisses his neck, warm hands brushing up under the hem of his shirt. “Want me to take a look?”

“It’s okay,” Brian says. “I need something to solve right now.”

“Want to bend me over your desk, take out some of that frustration?” Justin says, waggling his eyebrows.

Brian smiles and shakes his head, bumping his nose against Justin’s cheek.

“Want me to leave you alone so you can go back to not choosing a font?”

Brian laughs, softly, and shakes his head again, breathing deep in Justin’s hair.

He pulls back a minute or two later, and looks at Justin, takes his face gently in his hands.

“It’s not the work that’s keeping me up,” he says.

“I figured,” Justin says, just barely smiling. “Want to talk about it?”

Brian sighs, takes another long breath of him, in and out. “I checked in on Gus today. It looks- it looks like he and Lily, they’re having problems.”

“Bad?” Justin says, stroking his cheek.

“They were fighting. Angry, messy, someone said ‘divorce.’”

Justin closes his eyes. “I’m sorry,” he murmurs.

“I guess I should have expected it,” Brian says, looking out the window. “Mel and Linds’ on-again-off-again marriage for a model relationship and my genes? He was doomed from the start.”

“Hey,” Justin says. He turns Brian’s head back towards him. “That’s my husband you’re talking about.”

Brian smiles, wan, looking at him with deep sad helpless eyes. “I just- it’s so infuriating, to not be able to do anything more than watch.”

“I know,” Justin says, rising up onto his toes to kiss Brian on the cheek. Brian closes his eyes and leans into it, feels a tiny fragment of the tension drain from his body.

Justin puts his hands on his shoulders. “Come back to bed,” he murmurs, and Brian lets himself be drawn out of the room and back down the hall.

Justin undresses him tenderly, leaving small light kisses on the new patches of skin he uncovers. They fall into bed, mouths fused.

Brian’s under him, hair brushed back off his forehead by Justin’s greedy hands, when he pulls back for a moment.

“You okay?” Justin says.

“I-” Brian says, strokes down Justin’s arms. “Could you- the cuffs?”

Justin shows no surprise, thank God, just kisses him one more time and murmurs _of course_ before moving to get the padded manacles out of the bedside table.

He clicks each cuff shut around Brian’s wrists, checking the tightness. “Like this?” Justin says, and Brian wraps his legs around his waist.

“Yeah,” he says. “Like this.”

After, he lets Justin fuss over him, cleaning him up, massaging his sore forearms, fetching him water and lotion and a towel for the wet spot. He’d forgotten how this feels, the lightness in his stomach, it’s- not like flying, not a euphoria, exactly, more knowing that there’s nothing to worry about, not when the world is small and safe and warm, sharp edges filed lovingly away.

“You’re better than drugs,” he tells Justin, who laughs and spoons him, lacing their fingers together against Brian’s chest. Brian falls asleep like that, drifting into it easily, with Justin’s hands holding him close, his lips on his shoulder, his softened cock against Brian’s well-used ass.

They’re still in the same position when they wake up. Brian rolls over to see Justin watching him, gentle worry and deep warm affection blended on his face. 

“Morning,” Justin says, leaning in for a long sloppy open-mouthed kiss. Brian looks at him, gorgeous smooth body and beautiful face, and lets himself be selfishly distracted.

“It’s the weekend,” he murmurs. Justin smiles. “Yeah.”

Brian runs a hand through his hair, trails his fingers down his neck. “What do you say we turn off our phones and don’t answer the door for a few days?”

Justin kisses him again, smiling into it, deep and hungry. His mouth is darkened and wet when he pulls back, and Brian can’t stop staring. He’s going to get fucked right now, two or three times, he knows, and then they’ll lie in bed all tangled and filthy and talk, nose-to-nose on the pillow, sliding easily back into sex every so often, closer and closer together in each new afterglow. 

Justin runs a finger along Brian’s bottom lip. “Now,” he says, “how the hell do you expect me to refuse an offer like that?”


	24. Chapter 24

Brian wakes up facedown in a pile of pillows. He pushes himself up onto his elbows, feeling the telltale swoosh in his head that means he is very much still drunk, and sees Justin on his side next to him, asleep or possibly passed out, limbs tangled in and out of the sheets.

It’s not too often that Brian gets this kind of chance to study Justin without any funny looks or sarcastic comments, so he does it now, drinks greedily in the soft lines of his face, sweet and tough in the same curves, his hair, his gorgeous hair, just the right length to grab while he’s fucking him, to use as a handhold while Justin sucks him off. 

Brian is well on his way to hard already, but that’s no surprise. He lets the sensation wash over him, building, brewing, while he looks at Justin, his chest, surprisingly broad and muscular for someone so small, his slender wrists, amazing skilled beautiful hands that can bring Brian to his knees with a touch and do the same to the art world with a brushstroke. His arms, strong, another surprise, and now Brian’s thinking about the last time Justin held him down and fucked him - it was in the afternoon, nothing special about the day, and Justin had offered to- do something, just something normal, make coffee, maybe, and he had been calamitously beautiful in the seaside daylight, so Brian had stripped off all his clothes, slow and sensuous, and said that he didn’t really want coffee but he could use a nice hard fuck. Justin had gaped at him, just for a moment but oh, God, the way it made Brian hard to know he could still get him tongue-tied, even after all these years, and then Justin had grabbed him and bent him over the dining room table and fucked him so brutally good that Brian came without even remembering that he had the ability to jerk himself off because all he knew was face down on the table, arms outstretched, Justin’s hands entwined with his and Justin’s cock ramming him hard enough that his whole upper body slid up and down the surface with every single thrust.

Now, Brian studies Justin’s arms and thinks about how he never knew he’d want to love someone who would be strong enough to hold him steady when he least expects it. He wants to lift the covers, look at more and more and more of Justin’s body, eye-fuck him inch by inch, but if he does that Justin might wake up and Brian wants to be able to look at him like this for just a few more moments, minutes if he can get them, hours, if he’d allow himself that gluttony.

Justin wakes after about ten minutes, in the end, stretching luxuriously, making the bedclothes slide tantalizingly lower on his stomach, and Brian stares.

Brian is absolutely still drunk, because the moment Justin smiles blinkingly at him, he murmurs, uninhibited, “You’re beautiful,” and Justin frowns, good-humored and a little confused, but when he sees that Brian doesn’t have anything else to say he smiles and kisses him, deep, deep, deep, body that Brian has just been admiring now pressed perfectly up against him, writhing delicious and warm. 

They kiss, and kiss, and Justin is starting to wrap around him now, one leg going up over his hips, arms clutching farther and farther around his back. Justin sighs, rolling them over so he’s on his back, Brian trapping him to the mattress, and Brian just keeps on kissing him, rough how Justin likes it, just enough to bruise, to really feel it.

He reaches under their bodies, feels Justin still open from the last time. Justin shivers when he fingers the very edge of his hole, testing the skin there, and when he lines up his cock Justin nods, frantic, and yanks him down to swallow his tongue yet again. 

Justin is smooth as velvet inside, always. Brian wants to crawl inside him, _be_ him in a way that should probably fucking terrify him, but instead it makes him feel loved and in love in a way he does not understand. Not that not understanding matters, Brian thinks, as Justin arches wondrously against him, since he doesn’t even want to try.

***

The living room is a wreck from the night before, leftover streamers and deflated balloons draped not unlike used condoms over the furniture. Brian takes one look at the mess and decides he can’t be bothered to deal with it right now, so he lies down on the couch where he and Justin had fucked past dawn last night after everyone went home, stretching long and relaxed over the cushions while Justin bustles around the kitchen.

Justin brings him coffee and toast and a sloppy warm kiss. Brian sits up, lets himself lean into Justin, watching him out of the corner of his eye as he eats his breakfast.

“So,” Justin says, and Brian drapes an arm around him, mouths at his temple. “Are you going to check in on Gus today?”

Brian nods. 

Justin strokes his hair. “You want me to be there?”

“You have work,” Brian says, smiling faintly. “Don’t put those appointments off for me.”

Justin frowns and pokes him. “Not what I asked.”

Brian sighs, kisses him on the cheek, lets his forehead rest against him for a moment. “No,” he says, soft. “It’s okay, I think it’s- better, if I do it alone.”

“Okay,” Justin says, deep gorgeous eyes so full of concern and care, and Brian wants to lock all the doors and let Justin conquer him until he forgets every aspect of the outside world.

“Okay,” Brian says back.

Justin smiles at him, kisses him lightly. “Promise you’ll tell me what’s going on? Good or bad?”

Brian kisses him on the mouth, longer this time. “Promise.”

***

Justin is having a hard time focusing on work today. The portrait project is an amazing opportunity, he knows, and usually he feels the most engaged he’s been in years when he’s drawing out the faces of the people he works with, who he’s slowly getting to know as more than just models. But each session this morning drags slower and slower, and they’re mostly new patients too, not the ones whose facial features and expressions he’s getting the knack of predicting before they happen. Blake can tell he’s distracted too, Justin’s certain, based on the curious looks he’s getting, but Blake doesn’t push it and Justin is glad.

Then his afternoon appointment cancels, and Justin goes home.

The living room is spotless, that’s the first thing he notices - not just tidy, but _sparkling_ , a faint scent of lemon cleaner in the air. 

_Shit_ , Justin thinks.

He finds Brian in his studio, of all places, staring at a painting. It’s one of the ones he works on when ideas for his current project desert him, a dual portrait of them, just a little too explicit to show at any public display, Brian arching, coming on top of him in extravagant graceful ecstasy, and Justin wrenching the sheets off the corner of the bed with one clenched fist, the other in Brian’s hair. The thing that makes it a piece Justin can’t show isn’t the sex, as it happens - sex, as Brian loves to remind him, is the trademark of his brand - but the expressions, the way they’re ripping each other to shreds with open wild eyes, a closeness that Justin doesn’t want anyone else to be allowed to see.

“I haven’t seen this one before,” Brian says, not turning around.

Justin walks down the steps to stand beside him before he replies.

“I wasn’t sure what you’d think.”

Brian looks at him, and Justin moves closer, nuzzles under his chin. “It’s-,” Brian says, quiet. “It’s hard to look at, and I’ve been looking at it for an hour and a half, so I’d know.”

Justin nods into his throat. He looks up, gesturing to the dropcloth on the wireframe chair.

“Want me to-”

“No,” Brian says, and pulls Justin more firmly against him.

Justin’s just about to ask the question when Brian answers it.

“They’re thinking of staying together _for the kids_ ,” he says. “Fucking straight people bullshit.”

Justin just looks at him, stroking his sides, trying to soothe him from his restless helpless energy.

“Mel and Lindsay and their _fucking_ awful oh-so- _perfect_ soulmate relationship,” Brian says, a distance starting to creep glassily into his eyes. Justin holds him tighter. “They did this to him, you know that? He was- he was supposed to be better than me. Smarter. Healthier. And instead he’s- he’s like my fucking _mother_!”

Justin barely has to think to react to that. He slams a palm into Brian’s chest, tearing him away from the painting, turning them to face the wall. “Listen to me,” Justin says, pulling as much steel into his voice as he can. “You are not your parents. Gus is not your parents. You- you both love the people you love in a way I- _everyone_ can only hope and try our goddamn best to do. You have a fucking gift that no one I’ve ever met anywhere has, and it sure as hell didn’t come from your mom or your dad, but you gave it to Gus, and he is not going to do to the kids what your parents did to you.”

Brian’s staring at him with terrible vulnerable woundedness, so Justin tells him, “Say you know it.”

Brian closes his eyes.

“Say it.”

“I-” Brian says.

Justin glares.

“I fucking know it, okay?” Brian says, and then he’s just standing there looking lost, and Justin gathers him into his arms, kisses along his neck, tries to drown him in loving affection.

Brian’s breathing has only just slowed when he starts to lead Justin over to the battered paint-stained couch by the window. They sink onto it in each other’s arms, not kissing, not fucking, just absorbing each other’s bodies.

“I am-” Brian says. “I am so fucking madly in love with you.” Justin whimpers at that, looking up at him with near-teary eyes, burrowing closer into his chest. “Promise me,” Brian whispers, fierce. “Promise me you’ll tell me, if- if you’re ever unhappy. Please.”

Justin does start to cry a little then, can’t help himself. He presses himself to Brian as hard as he can, presses kisses frantically to his jaw, his cheek. He takes Brian’s head in his hands.

“I promise,” he says, still steely. “But _Brian_ \- _fuck_ \- there is no one else, any place, any time, who can give me what you do.”

Brian’s looking at him a little wide-eyed now, as if he’s never thought of this before, and Jesus fucking Christ, maybe he _hasn’t_ , so Justin clutches him, whispers _you’re everything I’ll ever need_ , and Brian keeps staring at him with those wondrous terrified eyes.

They fuck on the couch, slow, Brian’s legs spilled up and across, Justin rocking into him until he screams out _OH GOD I LOVE YOU_ , coming helplessly in Justin’s hands. They limp up to the bedroom afterwards, Brian smiling at him softly with a gentle hopeful awe that makes Justin’s heart ache, and they spend the evening curled around each other on the bedspread, talking, eating pizza out of the box, watching meaningless things that stay on while they have fantastic liquid wanton sex, joyful delirious passion in the green-blue light of the TV.

“Has something- changed?” Brian murmurs, against his ear, as he’s pulling out of Justin, settling his warm satisfied body against himself. 

“I don’t think so,” Justin says back, smiling in the way he does when he’s sex-drunk, gorged on carnal ecstasy until he can’t stand up. “Do you?”

Brian shakes his head, but gently, because he’s resting his chin on Justin’s shoulder. “No, I just- once in a while I start to see things more clearly, and it feels good.”

Justin smiles, leans back to kiss him, takes his hand. “You want to know what I think?”

“Always,” Brian says - should be at least a little sarcastic, for form’s sake, but Justin is relaxed and obscenely sated in his lap, so _fuck_ form - and kisses him on the joint of his neck and shoulder.

“I think you’re learning how to be happy. For real,” Justin says.

“Yeah,” Brian says, and takes a pause. “Everything’s going to turn out okay with Gus, isn’t it?”

“He’ll be fine,” Justin says. “No matter what happens, he’s strong and smart and he will find a way to make sure he and Lily and the kids are all stable and cared for.”

“How’d you know?” Brian murmurs. He wants to look at Justin as he says it, but he also can’t stop kissing against his hair.

“It’s what you’d do,” Justin says, squeezing his hand.


	25. Chapter 25

On the fourth day after Justin dies, Brian wakes up alone. He sits up, looking around, momentary panic flashing, a worry that he’d dreamed the past few days, hallucinated them, some immensely cruel cosmic joke.

But the other side of the bed is warm and the air smells like Justin, so Brian closes his eyes and breathes for a moment before leaving the bedroom.

Justin is standing, rumpled and incandescent, at the kitchen island, looking at-

“Oh, fuck,” Brian says.

Justin turns away from the big fluffy cat, who’s sitting neatly upright on the corner of the countertop, tail coiled around his front paws. “You have a _cat_?” he says, eyes laughing, disbelieving.

Brian pinches the bridge of his nose. “No.”

Justin frowns, scrunching up his nose in the way that means he’s equal parts perplexed and amused. Brian wants to get him back in bed right this second and lick that expression off his face.

Brian glares at the cat. “How did you even-”

“You _talk_ to him?” Justin says, starting to smile.

“Sometimes,” Brian says, because he’s an idiot and he’s more than a little distracted by the way Justin’s hair is tangled over his forehead, silky strands glinting in the sun.

“So-”

“He’s a stray,” Brian says, still staring daggers at the island. “There are six of them, they like it here. Fuck knows why.”

Justin puts a hand on the cat’s head, who noses amiably against it. “And you let them in the house?”

Brian tugs him gently away from the counter. “They get in sometimes, I don’t know how. Come on, come back to bed.”

Justin laughs. “Not until you tell me how you came to the conclusion that you could coexist with a bunch of _pets_.”

“They’re not pets,” Brian says, trying to sound annoyed, a task that’s harder than usual, mostly because of how he can’t stop staring at Justin’s mouth. “And it’s a long story.”

Justin walks over and puts both hands on Brian’s shoulders. “We have all the time we want, according to you.”

Brian rolls his eyes, but even as he does it he’s inhaling Justin, pressing their bodies closer together in warm flush comfort that’s so good it feels like something huge and fragile is tearing apart inside him.

“God, you’re annoying,” he murmurs, and Justin laughs. “You have no idea how much I’ve missed you.”

Justin looks at him then, all wide soft eyes, and kisses him, long and gentle. “No,” he says. “I do.”

***

Brian’s been having a good morning, the day he leaves the house and hears a weird sound coming from the sagebrush cluster next to the front door. He’d woken up with no hangover and made a reasonable successful facsimile of an omelet, and when he’d checked in on Justin he’d been singing tunelessly to himself while drinking his coffee and walk-dancing around the condo, and for maybe a whole minute Brian had been able to imagine with startling clarity that he’d just woken up in Manhattan and was watching unnoticed from the little nook in the hallway.

So he’s feeling pretty okay, really, when he opens the front door and hears a tiny high-pitched squeaky sound. He wiggles the door back and forth a few times, but the hinges don’t seem to make the same noise. Brian frowns, dismisses it, and walks out down the steps.

Then there’s a louder mewl, followed by a series of rustling noises. Brian turns, ready to chew out whichever asshole has let their dog off the leash on the cliff, but there’s no dog, and no people around either.

One of the sagebrush plants moves.

Brian strongly considers ignoring it, but if there’s a scorpion family or some shit living next to the house, he decides, it’s probably better to know now rather than later. He walks up slowly and looks down.

Something looks back.

Brian frowns, again, and brushes the branches apart. He’s greeted by twelve round eyes, all staring up at him in creepy unison. One of them makes a little _eeeeeep_ noise, and then all the others join in, tiny fanged mouths all crying at him.

“Jesus fucking Christ,” Brian says.

They’re kittens, he can tell, tiny, very young, probably just arrived - who the fuck kills _kittens_? - and since animals don’t go through the human arrival process, they’ve been put here. On his front step. On a Monday.

“I-” Brian says, and then realizes how stupid it is to try and talk to a pile of cats.

He turns and leaves, pretending not to notice that two of the cats have detached themselves from the group under the bush and are following him down the path. He shuts the car door, makes sure none of them have made it inside, and drives off.

Since it’s just turning out to be one of those days, when Brian gets back from work, not only are the fucking cats still there, but Vic and Michael are on the doorstep as well.

Michael has the fluffy one cupped in his hands and is making ridiculous baby noises at it. “You didn’t mention you’d adopted kittens!” he croons, not even looking away from the furry little shit as Brian approaches.

“I did _not_ ,” Brian says through gritted teeth, “adopt them.”

“They seem to think otherwise,” Vic says, igrinning. He picks up the tuxedo kitten and holds it Lion King-style facing him. “Look at this heartbreaker. I’m going to name him Oscar Wilde.”

“No one is naming any of these assholes,” Brian says, gesturing at the rest of the kittens, asleep in a pile next to the door.

Oscar Wilde squeaks.

“I agree,” Vic says. “Your new dad _is_ kind of a dick.”

***

“It’s not _that_ funny,” Brian says, watching Justin giggle madly into his coffee, a new fit of laughter hitting him every time he looks up.

Justin kisses him on the cheek. “It _is_ that funny. Sorry.”

Brian has to laugh, just a little, leading Justin down to the living room. They settle in one corner of the couch, looking out onto the ocean, Justin very nearly in his lap. Brian kisses his neck, relishing the warm rough cotton of Justin’s T-shirt against his bare torso.

“So what happened next?” Justin says.

***

Brian closes his eyes and counts to five before opening them again. Unfortunately, Vic and Michael and the kittens are still there.

“What are you doing here?”

Vic grins and holds up a bag. “Provisions. We haven’t seen you in the café in a while.”

Michael makes big best-friend eyes at him. Brian groans.

“I’ve been busy.”

“Doing what?” Michael says. Vic doesn’t say anything, which is worrying.

“Jesus,” Brian says. “Nothing. Just- work.” He takes the bag from Vic. “I .... Thanks. For the stuff. Now, I have a lot I need to do, so would you mind?”

“Sure,” Vic says, smiling just a little bit too broadly. “Good to see you.”

He turns and walks away, Michael following with a look of confused reluctance.

Brian’s just started putting away the food ( _chicken Parmesan, Deb? Really?_ ) when there’s a knock at the door.

“Just realized I’d better give you some tips on caring for the new charges,” Vic says, grinning as he pushes past into the house. “I’m assuming you’ve never taken care of anything bigger than a goldfish.”

“Make that a dandelion,” Brian says, slightly absently. He shakes himself. “And I’m not- taking _care_ of them. You know me, Vic. You think I care about some mongrelly strays?”

“Yes,” Vic says, without hesitation, not even fucking looking at him. “Although I don’t really give a fuck about that. I just happen to know cats, and it looks like they’ve bonded with you, so I don’t think you’ll be rid of them any time soon.”

As if on cue, the tabby kitten pops up over the back of the sofa. “Hi there!” Vic says, so cheerful it makes Brian wince. He goes over to pet it.

“Vic,” Brian snaps, suddenly very much done with everything. “Just take the cat and go, would you?”

“Sorry,” Vic says, still smiling, still cheerful. “No can do.” _Fuck you_ , Brian thinks. He’s surprised when he realizes he didn’t say it out loud.

Vic turns to face him, leaning back against the sofa, and Brian is reminded startlingly strongly of meeting Vic years and years before the diagnosis and everything that came with it, a vibrant young devil-may-care character with enough swagger to fill a whole nightclub.

“You haven’t been around lately because you’re dwelling on him,” Vic says, smiling, still, but with no amusement in his voice.

“I-”

“Save it.”

Brian just looks at him.

“You could do with having a few someones around to take care of,” Vic says, picking up the tabby and stroking her gently. “It might even remind you to take care of yourself.”

Brian takes in a breath and holds it. He lets it out.

As Vic walks to to leave, he adds, “And I’d recommend you name them before Debbie does if you don’t want them all to be named Scrumptious Puddykins.”

“Fuck you,” Brian says, feeling almost friendly. Vic flips him off stylishly before shutting the door.

***

“So _did_ you name them?” Justin’s stretched out on the couch now, head in Brian’s lap. He’s warm and so real and his skin is like silk, and Brian feels drunk on him, really, stupidly, unsteadily fail-the-field-sobriety-test falling-over drunk, so he has to take a second to put together the answer.

“No,” he says. “They’re- free agents, right? Didn’t seem right to just give them some random name.”

Justin looks right up at him. “Do I sense a hint of companionship?”

“Look,” Brian says. “I don’t- mind them.”

Justin smiles. He gestures at the window, where two other cats are sitting now. “I think the white one is like you,” he says. “Seems independent-minded.”

As it happens, the big white cat with the green-grey eyes is one of the ones Brian feels vaguely more than tolerant towards, not that he’s ever say it. And anyway, they have many more things to attend to. 

“Are we done talking about the goddamn cats?” he says. No bite to it. 

Justin laughs and sits up, straddling his waist, leaning in for a hot wet kiss. “Whatever you say, darling,” he murmurs, nearly falsetto, pressing Brian back against the couch.

***

Brian doesn’t tell him the last part. He doesn’t mention that he came very close to driving all the kittens to the other side of the city and leaving them on the doorstep of a more community-minded person, to devising a plan to scare them badly enough that they wouldn’t want to follow him around any more. Each time, he stopped himself.

Then one day, Brian has a strange thought. He calls Vic.

“What age do cats’ eyes stop changing color?”

He can practically hear Vic’s confusion over the phone before he answers. “Yours should have stopped already.”

Brian looks at the small black cat with the pale piercing blue eyes, sitting on the windowsill above the sink. “Oh,” Brian says. “Good to know.”

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> yes, cats can move in and out of the time freeze, it’s one of the things they can get into without permission (this is not for reasons of physics, it’s just because the idea amuses me and hopefully anyone else who’s ever seen a cat contort itself to fit inside a box that is objectively too small)


	26. Chapter 26

Justin’s studio is always filled with portraits now. Some are triptychs, overlapping faces in different stages of trepidation and rawness and reaction, others single pieces with images layered on top of each other or scattered across a larger canvas. 

“You’re making progress,” Brian says, coming home from work to see five entirely new faces on easels around the room.

“Finally,” Justin says, coming over to kiss him, holding his paint-covered hands behind his back. Brian grins and nips at his soft smile, brushing their noses together. 

Justin walks over to the sink and reaches for the tap. “I had Alice and Etta and Braeden come over today to look at them. They like them so far, say it’s weird to see themselves represented like this. But they feel positive about the project and where it’s at, so that’s good.”

“Must be strange,” Brian says, handing him a towel as he turns off the water. 

Justin pulls his work sweatshirt over his head and takes Brian’s hand, lets himself be led up the stairs out of the studio. “Yeah.”

Over dinner that night, Justin’s quiet. Brian tries to coax him out of it at first, making jokes and innuendos in roughly equal quantities, but the most he gets is a distracted smile.

“You okay?” he says, eventually.

Justin looks up, looks right at him for the first time that meal. “I’m- yeah. Just thinking about how I forgot how hard the last few weeks of a project are. When the burnout starts.”

Without really thinking about it, Brian reaches for his right hand, starts working out tension that’s no longer there. Justin smiles over at him, so sincerely sweet and gorgeous, places his other hand over Brian’s to still him.

“Not that,” Justin says. He brushes his lips over the back of Brian’s hand, still smiling faintly. “More just- the end is in sight, and that always brings up a lot of feelings. Being alone in the studio with all those faces, it’s ... a lot.”

Brian nods, moves his chair over until he can lean against Justin’s shoulder. “Want me to step back on work a little until it’s done, be around the house more?”

Justin loops an arm around him and kisses his cheek. “You’re sweet,” he says. Brian makes the obligatory face. “But it’s okay.”

It’s not until they’re lying in bed, comfortably overlapping, when Justin says, “How would you feel about me asking Asher over to work with me on the last stages of the project?”

Brian looks at him. “You don’t need my-”

“I’m not asking for permission,” Justin says. “I wanted to know how you’d feel if I invited my ex-partner to come work in my studio, in our house, for a few weeks until the project’s done.”

“Would it make you happier? About the work?”

Justin nudges him. “Not an answer to my question.”

Brian smiles with a hint of shadow so tiny that anyone who’d known him for less than fifty years would have missed it. “If you’re happy, I’m happy,” he says. “So invite him.”

Justin is frowning, barely. “Okay.”

Brian tugs him in a little closer, wraps his arms around Justin. “Really,” he says. “I think it’s a good idea for you to do it. It’s been too long since you’ve worked with anyone else around.”

Justin rests his cheek against Brian’s collarbone. He’s smiling in a complicated way that Brian isn’t sure about, but he looks tired, and Brian has never been one to pull at threads where Justin is concerned.

***

Brian’s been different, lately. It’s not a huge change, or anything like that, but Justin’s caught him more than once staring off into space during work time, or wearing a suit with a wrinkle it it, or blue socks with brown shoes, and for Brian, that’s ... odd, to say the least.

Justin comes up behind him one day as he’s studying the windows on the cliff side of the house. He winds his arms around Brian from the back, buries his face in the soft clingy cotton of his wifebeater and breathes in. It’s not an entirely selfless act, Justin thinks, wryly, resting his cheek against Brian’s smooth muscled back, but he is here for a reason.

He slides one hand up Brian’s chest and feels Brian catch it, rub his thumb fondly over the back. Justin kisses his shoulder, smiles into it, letting his breathing come to match Brian’s.

“What’s wrong?” he says, finally. Brian tenses just the slightest bit.

“You always know, don’t you?”

Justin nuzzles into the curve of his neck. “I just want you to know I’m here. Whatever it is.”

Brian turns around and kisses him softly. Justin smiles and leads him over to the big chair in the corner of the sunporch, tugs him down until they’re settled comfortably against each other.

“I think this is- the freak-out,” Brian says. “The moment. You know. When you start to grasp the idea of eternity.”

Justin nods. “You’re feeling it?”

“A little. Just starting to.”

They’re a warm little corner of the cool darkening room. Justin shifts a little closer. “Want to talk it out?”

Brian gives him a soft wry laugh. “What do you think?”

“I think,” Justin says, kissing his temple, “that you don’t want to say whatever it is that’s bothering you because there’s still a tiny little voice in there somewhere that’s telling you I’ll run.”

“Yeah?” Brian’s tone is light, but his jaw is hardened now in a way it wasn’t before.

Justin looks him right in the eye. “Yeah. And I would like to personally tell that voice to fuck off. How long have you known me, now? I am not going to run, Brian. You told me half a century ago that you were in this for the long haul, and you meant it, and I knew that I’d never want to be with anyone else.”

Brian closes his eyes at that, pulls Justin sharply against him and breathes him in, suddenly greedy, hands just too firm to be gentle. Justin doesn’t say anything, just presses still closer, kissing softly at whatever skin he can reach.

“I-” Brian says. When he doesn’t continue, Justin doesn’t push, just rolls his face against Brian’s collarbone, a warm steady caress.

Bryan strokes his hair, rubs gently along his back. “I don’t think I want to exist for eternity if I can’t do it with you,” he says, a little rushed, all the words spilling out before he can think too much about it. “And when I feel that, I can’t stop hating myself for wanting to tell you, because I never want to hold you back. I never want you to think that you- that you have to stay.”

Justin’s eyes are too bright now, and Brian curses himself for going too far, saying it out loud. He dips his head, trying to think of a way to take it back, but then warm hands are pushing his chin up, forcing him to see.

“Brian,” Justin says, steel-voiced. “Brian. Look at me.”

Brian looks.

”Did you think I didn’t _know_?” Justin says, stroking his face with one thumb, soft and sweet even as his hands are iron-fast on Brian’s jawbones. “Do you think I don’t feel _exactly_ the same fucking way? It’s- I mean this in the most literal way possible, asshole, so take it literally: I would have to be desperately, hopelessly, insanely in love with you to have put up with you for this long, and I cannot wait to keep on putting up with you for however long infinity turns out to be.”

Brian thinks he probably looks terrified, but he’s more focused right now on the way he’s forgotten how to breathe.

”You left, before,” he says. “With good reason.”

Justin just keeps smiling at him, eyes locked on his. “And _you_ kicked me out. More than once. We were kids then, Brian. We didn’t have- _this_.”

Brian’s voice feels small and choked. He doesn’t know what to do with it. “Mel and Linds broke up here.”

Justin raises his eyebrows. “We aren’t Mel and Linds.”

And it’s this, now, the thing that Brian can’t do without, the air crackling audibly between them, Justin glowing with power and energy, but-

“I want to be romantic with you,” Brian says. “And the first time we were supposed to get married, you called it off because I was acting like that.”

Justin laughs, just barely, and shakes his head. He leans in and kisses Brian just below his left eye. “Jesus,” he murmurs. “I love it when you’re sweet, and considerate, and all those things you call romantic. What I don’t want is you changing yourself to be what you think I want.”

”But- I’m not the same person you first fell in love with. I’m going to change, over that much time. You will too.”

”And thank God for that,” Justin says. He’s looking at him again, clear eyes slicing him open. “The man I fell in love with was gorgeous, and independent, and unlike anything I’d ever seen, but he was also afraid and in pain. All the time. Brian, I love you for _you_ , not- your past, or your issues, or any of those things that we can let go of in the long run if we want to. You’ll always be the person I’m in love with, because you’re always yourself. And if you’re stable and happy, so much the better.”

Brian thinks this might be what it feels like to hallucinate while not on drugs. “They’ll all make fun of us,” he says, feeling not absolutely in control of his body, or his brain, for that matter. “Never leaving the honeymoon period? Pathetic.”

Justin hums. “Guess we’ll just have to learn to live with it.”

Brian reaches for- he doesn’t know what, really. Just Justin. “I can do that,” he murmurs.

Justin kisses him then, hungry and rough, and Brian wants to throw him down and just take him, but he feels a lightness he’s never experienced before, not on any drug, either, and it’s so startling and new that he can’t move.

Justin pulls back, panting. Brian strokes his neck, trying to anchor himself, anything to give some normality to this soaring freedom.

”Sometimes,” he says, without meaning to, “I watch you paint, and I want to be the canvas, to lie under you while you put me together.”

Justin smiles and nuzzles him, something soft and fragile in his eyes. He murmurs, against Brian’s chin, “When you laugh during sex, you’re so beautiful that I hold off on coming so I can look at you longer.”

Brian closes his eyes and brushes his lips over Justin’s ear, still feeling untethered in a sea of unbearable joy. “That day you kissed me in the art department, after Ethan, I would have let you do anything in the world to me.”

Justin grins and bumps against him. “Let me fuck you on the boards?”

Brian feels a smile creeping unanticipated onto his face. “They were shit anyway.”

“Given me the keys to the Corvette?”

“Uh-huh.”

“Blown me in your office?”

“If I’m remembering right, there’s historical proof of that one.”

Justin smirks. “Let me pick the movie?”

Brian presses their faces together, smile now widening on its own into a real grin. “What can I say? Love makes me stupid.”

Justin kisses him again, then draws back to stare at him some more. “Sometimes you look at me when you think I can’t see you, and it makes me want to toss whatever I’m doing and beg you to ravish me into oblivion.” 

“When I look at you,” Brian says, because he’s picking up speed now and he doesn’t just think about saying it, he _needs_ it in a totally new way, “touch you, kiss you, fuck you, anything, I know I’m home.”

He wants to tell Justin more things, now that he’s on this roll, tell him about how he looks when he wears Brian’s clothes and the way that he holds Brian in his sleep, but it’s a little difficult with the way Justin’s just jumped on him and started inhaling his mouth. Brian does grab on this time, gives back everything he has until they’re a writhing, groaning mess, drunk on it, so happily lovesick that everything else, everything that’s not this, just seems like a pale small version of reality.

***

The next morning, Brian’s lying in bed and thinking about how he really doesn’t feel like dealing with proofing the new drafts that are supposed to be in today when Justin comes in with two cups of coffee and a broad sweet smile. 

Brian takes him in, soft sweats and a tight clingy gray t-shirt. Justin leans down to kiss him after he’s set the mugs on the nightstand, and Brian yanks him down into the bed, rolling them over while Justin laughs.

“You’re ridiculous,” Justin tells him. 

Brian kisses him again. “I love you,” he says. He feels high on something really good, light and strong at eight in the morning.

“Fuck,” he adds a second later. “I don’t want to go in today.”

Justin props himself up on top of him. “So work from home.”

Brian smiles at him. “Don’t want to get in your way.”

Justin rolls his eyes. “Just shut up and call the office and tell them you’re not coming in, okay?”

Unable to make the smile go away, Brian holds onto his wrist as Justin stands. “Okay.”

Asher comes over an hour or so later in clay-stained jeans, and he has the good grace not to look surprised when Brian answers the door.

“Morning,” Asher says, shifting his sketchpad from one hand to the other as Brian gestures him through the door. “Day off?”

“Something like that,” Brian says. “He’s down there already. Setting up.”

Asher smiles at him with unsettlingly open grey eyes. “The stuff he’s doing with this project- it’s amazing.”

Brian nods. “I’ve seen the paintings.”

Asher shakes his head. “I mean- when he’s working. You know how he gets, so focused on each detail he wouldn’t notice if the building collapsed.”

Brian bites on a smile.

“Want to come watch for a little?”

Brian doesn’t answer, but Asher’s already leading him to the stairs to Justin’s studio.

Justin’s standing in the center of a circle of easles, making tiny adjustments to one of the paintings with a needle-thin brush dipped in white paint. He doesn’t seem to register them entering, and Brian’s taken back through years of watching him work, different studios and different cities but always this same razor-edged brilliance.

Justin flicks one more white crescent onto the canvas, then stands. “Hi,” he says, not turning around.

Asher smiles and starts arranging sketches on one of the work tables. Justin puts down the brush and walks up to Brian, leans with his hands back into a long soft kiss.

Brian touches his hair when they part. “Mind if I work down here today?”

Justin gives him a small confused smile

“It’s just been a while since I’ve watched you in your natural environment,” Brian says, smirking, and Justin grins and kisses him again and threatens a swipe at him with the paintbrush. 

He turns to drag one of the more comfortable chairs over to the side and spots Asher. Brian nods at him before getting back to work.


	27. Chapter 27

It’s the third night this week that Justin’s woken up like this, nerves thrumming and tense. He lies still for a moment, runs his hands through his hair and weighs the idea of getting up and making tea against the insulated warmth of the bedclothes.

Next to him, Brian stirs. “Everything okay?” he mumbles, eyes still mostly closed, curling himself closer around Justin.

Justin smiles and kisses his forehead. “I’m fine. I’m sorry I woke you.”

Brian tugs him in a little more and brushes soft lips over his jaw. “Worrying about the show again?”

Justin laughs, softly. He lets Brian tuck the blankets more tightly around them, resting his head on Brian’s chest. “Yeah,” he says, finally.

“You’re brilliant,” Brian murmurs, sleepy again. “The work’s brilliant. Everything will turn out great, Sunshine, you’ll see.”

Allowing himself to be coaxed back to calmness, for the moment, anyway, Justin kisses his collarbone and smiles as he slips back into sleep.

He wakes up again a few hours later to a fading pink sunrise tracing over the ocean and Brian still holding him warm and close, fast asleep. Justin has too much to do already today, no time to waste, but he wastes some anyway, nestling back and breathing in deep slow breaths of Brian and home.

***

The day, like all of them recently, is a blur of meetings and paintings and organizing and last-minute changes and wrapping and packing and carefully balanced schedules and speaking orders and venue details and final check-ins.

Also, Justin sort of has a secret, which doesn’t help.

He doesn’t have a plan to tell Brian about how he’d accidentally maybe been keeping something kind of big from him, no particular intention for it, not today. But when Brian gets home from work and tosses his briefcase on the counter and strides over to where Justin’s hunched over stacks of stress-infused transport scheduling plans, when he turns Justin around and kisses him hungrily against the table like he’s been dying for it all day, rubbing the soreness from his shoulders with warm firm hands as he does, Justin is so helplessly in love that he can’t bear to be hiding it any longer.

Brian lets go of his mouth, still stroking out the tension on the sides of Justin’s neck with his thumbs, and smiles radiantly. “Working late?” he murmurs, looking at him with such sincerity that it hurts. Justin tries to keep his wince internal.

“Probably,” he says. “I- can I show you something?”

Brian looks at him, eyes sharpening with concern. “What’s wrong?”

 _Fuck_. Justin bites his cheek. “It’s not- it’s hard to explain. Can I just-”, he says, gesturing to the stairs, and Brian nods and follows.

In the studio, Justin has to move about ten stacked canvases out of the way to find the one he’s looking for. It’s covered, has been since he finished it, when he realized that what had been a flash of inspiration desperately needing to be painted out had become some kind of liability.

Brian looks at the canvas, still concealed, then at Justin. “You want to tell me why you’re acting like this is a corpse you’ve been hiding in here and now you need me to help you bury it?”

Justin tugs at the sleeve of his sweatshirt, thinks about trying to explain.

Brian moves closer to him, puts a hand on Justin’s arm. “It’s okay,” he says, soft, dark liquid eyes steady on Justin’s.

Justin closes his eyes, braces himself, and pulls off the dropcloth.

“Jesus,” Brian says.

“Yeah,” Justin says.

The painting is of them, in the multipanel portrait style Justin’s been developing for months, for the show. There’s two couples, one from an eternity ago, Justin small and downcast and turned in on himself and Brian looking at him with fearful wounded eyes, the two of them seemingly desperate to touch but in pain at every point of contact.

On the other panel of the canvas, it’s them now, strong, healing, and intertwined in a deep contented happiness, bodies contoured eagerly together, joined hands, foreheads resting together and eyes laughing.

Brian reaches out to the left panel, their past selves, strokes gently over the dried acrylic that makes up the cuff of Justin’s sleeve. He turns. “When did you do this?”

“A few days ago,” Justin says. “I didn’t- plan it, or anything. I just had the idea and I had to get it out.”

Brian nods.

“I wasn’t sure if I should show you,” Justin says. “It’s- kind of intense, I know.”

Brian’s looking at the painting again, studying the details now, Justin can tell. “It’s,” he says. “Yeah.”

Then he glances back at Justin. “This is the kind of thing you’ve been doing for the show.”

“Yeah,” Justin says. He should say more, really, but he still can’t.

Brian does it for him, and Justin wants to kick himself when he hears the soft note of trepidation in his voice. “Are you going to show this one?”

Justin takes his hands, pulls him in close. “Not without your permission. This isn’t like the others, I didn’t- ask you. I should have.”

Brian shrugs. “You draw me all the time.”

“This is different,” Justin says. “So- I’m sorry.”

Brian looks at him sharply then, mouth tightening just a tiny bit. “You shouldn’t have to apologize for this. It’s- you’re _amazing_ , what you can do.”

He pauses a moment, fingers of one hand tapping on his leg. “I need to think about it, okay?”

“Yeah,” Justin says, tugging him in a little closer, needing to feel the strong warm line of him against his side. “Of course.”

Brian takes his face in his hands and kisses the space between his eyebrows. “And next time, would you just tell me instead of letting it keep you up at night?”

Justin feels himself smiling, very faintly. “Okay,” he murmurs, and Brian smiles back.

“Takeout okay?” he says, taking Justin’s hand and leading him out of the studio.

Justin watches the smooth familiar lines of his back and can’t believe how lucky he is. “Perfect,” he says.

***

Brian goes slow in bed that night, dropping little kisses on Justin’s forehead and cheeks and shoulders and neck and chest every few seconds, stroking over his body with warm fingers. It feels like being cherished, and protected, and Justin lets himself get lost.

“Justin,” Brian’s panting into his neck, grinding low and beautifully deep into him, “Justin, Justin, oh, fuck-” and Justin holds him tighter. He kisses Brian’s jaw as he ruts into him, soft little desperate noises falling out of his reddened mouth. “I love you,” Justin whispers, and Brian whines and buries his face on his neck, inhales in long greedy strokes, hands finding purchase in Justin’s hair.

After, they bask in it, soak in suffused contentedness. Brian plays with his hair, kisses him all over his face, and laces their fingers together. Justin just allows the warm security of the moment to block out everything else.

Then Brian pulls back so that they’re looking at each other. Justin strokes his face, doesn’t say anything.

“I don’t want to have that painting in the show,” Brian says. “I- can’t do the thing you do, lay out all your feelings for other people to see. It’s too private. I’m sorry-”

Justin cuts him off with a kiss, smiling slow and gentle into it. “Don’t be sorry,” he murmurs. “You’re allowed to have boundaries in my work, Brian. I’m glad you told me.”

“Okay,” Brian says, eyes softened and warm, and then, “I love you.”

Justin smiles and kisses him again.


	28. Chapter 28

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> happy Friday and/or merry Christmas, y’all!

Justin’s been so busy with the lead-up to the show that Brian hadn’t even been thinking about it, not even in passing. But once the opening’s happened (to immense accords, of course, as a “remarkably human and sensitive endeavor”) he looks at the calendar and realizes.

Justin is in the living room at the moment, sketching stretched out on the couch. Brian crouches behind the arm of the couch and runs his hands through his hair, massaging his scalp. Justin smiles up at him, upside-down and lucent.

“Enjoying your newly empty schedule?” Brian says.

Justin laughs and sits up. “What could possibly have given you that idea?

Standing, coming around to sit next to him on the couch, Brian looks at him for a long moment before speaking again.

“So,” he says, “I was looking at the date.”

Justin frowns. “Yeah?”

Brian puts an arm around him. “Your deathday’s next week,” he says. “I know we haven’t really- talked about it.”

Justin presses up to him, resting his chin on Brian’s shoulder. “To be honest, I forgot about it,” he says, smiling just faintly.

“Everyone does- something different,” Brian says. “I mean, you saw- Vic reserves a nightclub, Jordan does that meditation shit-”

“-you insist on staying in bed and having cozy snuggly sex all day-”

Brian narrows his eyes but doesn’t deny it. Justin laughs. 

“I don’t know what I want to do,” he says. “I haven’t thought about it.”

“I figured,” Brian says, kissing his cheek. “Just thought I’d bring it up.”

Typically, it takes Justin only a few hours to come up with not just an idea but a full-fledged plan. Brian comes into the bedroom after work to find him surrounded by sketches, lists, bags.

“Jesus,” Brian says. “Did a tornado come to visit?”

“I had an idea,” Justin says, flipping him off with one hand and snatching up one of the many papers with the other. He’s beaming when he turns around.

Brian raises his eyebrows.

“I was thinking,” Justin says, “that I wished we could have another grace week. Just the two of us, spending time together.”

Brian smiles and walks over to ruffle his hair. “So you’re planning our getaway?”

Justin leans into his hand. “I hoped maybe you could take a week off, and we could stay at the place in Elyrium. Tell everyone to leave us alone, go dancing every night, have sex whenever we want-”

Grinning, Brian slips both arms around his waist, lifts him just off the ground and kisses him. Justin laughs when he pulls back. “And you want to do that for a week?” Brian says.

Justin frowns. “Well, I know you have work, but-”

“Fuck work,” Brian says, pulling him in as close as he can, breathing in his gorgeous exuberant vitality. “How about the whole goddamn month?”

They’ve really been together too long, now, to still be flinging themselves at each other like this, Brian thinks, vaguely, finding himself the sudden recipient of a frantic armful of warm hungry Justin. _Not that I’d trade it for anything in this or any other world_.

***

“You wanna go out?” Justin says, when they’re in the apartment, his bag on the floor, Brian’s neatly unpacked.

Justin’s lying stretched out on the bed, hands behind his neck, the vantage point from where he’s been making fun of Brian for ordering his shirts by color, material, and occasion in the closet. He’s relaxed, supple, flippant, perfect, and Brian looks at him and he just _wants_.

“No,” Brian says, and pounces.

It’s funny, he thinks, as Justin wrestles with him, laughing and playful, on the bed, the way it goes back and forth between them. The way they keep each other sane.

Justin flips them over, pulls off both their shirts, and Brian lets him, planning, waiting. When Justin’s distracted, leaning forward from where he’s straddling Brian’s waist, Brian grabs his wrists and muscles him over, back to the mattress.

Cursing and laughing, Justin bucks against his weight. Brian keeps his hands pinned, licks his lips at his heaving body. He wants to take Justin apart, slowly, painstakingly, and then put him back together again once he’s spent, body splayed open and used. Brian looks at him, and he knows that Justin knows what he wants, because his pupils are swallowing all the blue in his eyes and his mouth is dropping open the way it does when he starts to lose control.

“Want it?” Brian says, taking both Justin’s wrists in one hand so he can use the other to unsnap his jeans. He’s hard already, obviously, and Brian can’t resist squeezing, starting up a slow heavy rhythm that he knows will drive him insane.

Justin whimpers. “Fuck you.”

“Uh-uh,” Brian says, leaning down until their faces are a quarter inch apart.

Justin snaps at his chin, teeth bared, but Brian has him pinned to the bed with his free hand on his chest almost before he’d moved. Brian laughs down at him, his whole body a taut perfection, and Justin gives up. 

He lunges again, for Brian’s mouth, and this time Brian catches his shoulders the second they come off the bed and kisses him the way no one else kisses, like hot shameless ruthless sex.

Brian fucks him with every single piece of knowledge he’s carefully compiled over decades, every different way he knows to make Justin fall to pieces. He kisses him like a madman, unable to get deep enough, to have enough of the taste of him, and Justin just gasps and flails and comes and comes and comes, body shaking with it, a little more frayed every time, voice growing thin and weak and desperate even as he’s whimpering pleas for more.

Then they lie in bed and talk, and talk, and talk, hands sliding everywhere, sometimes fucking, sometimes not.

Brian’s holding him, on their sides, and they’re just smiling against each other’s mouths, warm and sleepy, and Brian realizes he has a question.

“When did you know I was in love with you?”

Justin blinks, props himself up on one elbow. He noses Brian’s cheek. “Early,” he says, lips just barely upturned. “Way, way back.”

“Was there- a moment? Something specific?”

Justin looks at him. Brian smiles back and shrugs. “I’ve just never asked, that’s all.”

Eyes warm and endless, Justin brushes a hand over his cheek and murmurs, “It was when I was living with you, after I got bashed. We were just- at the table, and you were working, and I was doing one of my exercises, the one with the binder clips, and my hand jerked and they would have all gone everywhere, but you reached out and caught the box, and started massaging my hand, because you’d been watching me the whole time while you pretended to work so that I could feel like I wasn’t under supervision.”

“Then you kissed me,” he says, smiling, softly, still eyes still on Brian’s. “And you... you kind of mussed up my hair, the way you do, and you made a joke and called me Sunshine. And I knew.”

Brian pulls him in even closer, kisses the bridge of his nose. “You usually did.”

Justin smiles against his jaw.

***

Justin looks up and it’s like the old days, Brian back from the grocery store in a ratty delicious tight sweater and jeans, long long long legs and bare feet and fluffed hair. Justin looks at him and tries not to lick his lips.

Brian grins and slides onto the couch, looks at him with sharp dark eyes until he’s almost shivering. “Miss me?” Brian murmurs, teeth knife-edged on the shell of his ear. Justin swallows a whimper and nods.

“I got those disgusting cheese cracker things you like,” Brian says, reaching an arm around him and squeezing his cock through his jeans, perfect pressure, perfect everything. “And I thought I could try and make dinner for a change, and you can watch me all neurotically so I don’t burn anything, and-”

Justin’s in his lap before he’s even decided to move, moaning _fuck me_ , starving for it, snarling in between rough hungry kisses. “Jesus, Brian, _fuck_ me,” he says, and Brian doesn’t even seem to visibly react, just slips him out of his clothes as easily as he’d sat down, and then he’s licking him, hot and wet and so fucking good but it’s not what Justin wants, so he grabs Brian by the hair and yanks him up to eye level and growls desperately for his cock and Brian gives it to him, oh, God, slamming into him so hard the couch rocks back against the wall, and Justin wants to scream but he can’t make noise because it’s too _good_ and he can’t _breathe_ and they didn’t even take their shirts off, holy _shit_ , and Justin is coming embarrassingly soon, a really good one, heavy and thorough, and Brian grins ferally down at him while he sobs it out, those pierce-right-through-you eyes clocking every time he fractures just a little more.

Afterwards, Justin feels dizzy, giggly, and Brian bundles him into his lap and kisses his hair and overall makes him feel so stupidly warm and happy that he’s seriously considering going to sleep like this, shirt on, no pants, but then Brian starts kissing down his neck and he can’t not press into it, spreading himself open again, and soon enough he’s rocking on Brian’s thighs, watching Brian watch him, nose to nose whenever they’re not eating each other’s faces off.

“You feel-” Brian says, as he has Justin hoisted up on the wall, fucking him face-to-face, Justin’s legs around his waist and his hands scrabbling in Brian’s hair as he goes for another kiss, “You feel so fucking good, Justin, Christ, I-”

It starts to get a little too much when they’re in the bed, nestled in bunched-up sheets, Brian taking him on his back and nuzzling sweetly under his chin, and it’s wonderful and perfect but it’s also starting to sting a little more than is really fun.

Brian flops onto him after a spectacular finish, starts nibbling across Justin’s collarbones, and Justin takes the opportunity to tug him up so they’re facing each other.

“I,” he says, and Brian licks across his mouth. He smiles, puts a palm on Brian’s chest to hold him off for a moment. “You’re fucking amazing,” Justin tells him, “but my ass needs a break,” and Brian laughs out loud, exhausted and jubilant, and kisses him gently.

“Sorry,” he murmurs, still laughing a little. “Just got a little- I don’t know.”

“Don’t apologize,” Justin says, rubbing his back, grinning. “God.”

Brian hums, self-satisfactorily, Justin thinks.

“You’re so good at taking care of me,” Justin says, sleepily, after, when they’re on clean dry linens, looped comfortably together. Brian looks at him.

“You’re a fucking miracle, Sunshine,” he says. “Every day.”

Justin smiles at him softly, kisses his neck, holds him just a little tighter. Brian thinks he might be saying something, but it’s hard to tell because he’s already slipping now into a deep happy comfortable sleep.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> fun fact: this chapter was partially written to the U2 album that Apple randomly downloaded to people’s phones in like 2014.


End file.
